


Twelve Days of Falling in Love

by Jenanigans1207



Series: Denial is a Hell of a Drug [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Christmas Cookies, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Special, Decorating, Holiday Cheer, Ice Skating, M/M, NSFW in later chapters, Twelve Days Of Christmas, Ugly Christmas Sweaters, Wrapping Gifts, a lot of soft, baking cookies, christmas card photos, journalist crowley, just very festive and warm, looking at christmas lights, more pine than a christmas tree, neither crowley nor aziraphale have any coordination, now journalist aziraphale, pining but make it festive, sharing gloves, some banter, the curve of old bones christmas edition, there are no brain cells in this one, they're really stupid
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:34:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 28,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28050213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenanigans1207/pseuds/Jenanigans1207
Summary: Beelzebub hesitates for just a moment, just the length of one heartbeat pounding against Crowley’s ribs. “Twelve.”“Twelve?” Aziraphale nearly jumps out of his seat at the sheer idea of it. “You want us to write twelve articles between now and Christmas?”--Or, what I'm affectionately referring to as "The Curve of Old Bones: Christmas Edition"
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: Denial is a Hell of a Drug [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2039054
Comments: 627
Kudos: 255





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Now THIS is the surprise!!! A Christmas special of The Curve of Old Bones!!
> 
> I worked hard to set the timeline for this and Curve to match perfectly so that this nestles exactly inside Curve and the events all flow together and play off of each other. I just didn't want to add 13 chapters dedicated to Christmas into the middle of Curve. The events of chapter 8 of Curve immediately precede this and this first chapter is happening exactly one day after those events. I redid the timeline like four times until I was happy with how the two fics worked together!
> 
> SO. This is a Twelve Days of Christmas fic meaning that every single day from now until Christmas, there will be an update. This upcoming Friday, the 18th, there will be an update to this AND to Curve. 
> 
> As I mentioned in Curve's most recent chapter (if you're reading Curve which isn't strictly necessary to read this but may help, please either read chapter 8 first or at least be aware that this has some spoilers for it), this fic means altered posting schedule for Curve. Because the events are now tied together, the next chapter of Curve goes up on Friday and then the chapter after that won't go up until Wednesday the 30th. And then it'll be back to it's regular posting schedule.
> 
> These will not be 10k chapters like Curve has turned into, I need some sanity. I may be fast at writing but I'm not fast enough to write a daily 10k. So I'm aiming for around 2-3k per chapter since this is just a fun Christmas side fic!
> 
> This fic is officially happening in real time. Meaning that while you read this, Crowley and Aziraphale are in Beelzebub's office, getting their assignments... It WILL be NSFW in later chapters (Chapter 8 specifically for certain) and I will mark those bits the same way I mark them in Curve. Uh, I feel like there's more I want to say but this note has already gotten super long so without further ado, I'll sneak on out of here and let you guys get to reading what sort of stupid situation they're finding themselves in now!
> 
> OH one last thing! Since I don't want to spoil all the things they do for each of the twelve days, I'll be adding tags as I post! I promise this is just super soft, angst free and very festive! I just really love Christmas season a lot, okay?

Being called into his boss’ office first thing in the morning is one or the things on a list of what Crowley wants to avoid. Especially when it’s a weekend and he arguably shouldn’t even be here. But alas, the curse of writing a daily article. Also on that list is being called into his boss’ office ever, at any hour of day, for any reason. Essentially, Crowley just doesn’t wish to interact with his boss. 

This feeling is tripled now as he’s being called into Beelzebub’s office  _ with  _ Aziraphale, just one day after Aziraphale had been given and accepted a permanent position at  _ Hellfire _ . 

There were plenty of possible things Beelzebub could want to talk to them about that didn’t involve firing both of them on the spot because they’d finally uncovered their lie. Logically Crowley knew there had to be another list: List of Things Beelzebub Wants to Talk About. The odds were high that Aziraphale was forming that list in his head right now because he, too, was likely doing a speed run of the seven stages of grief and mourning the loss of a job he hadn’t even properly begun yet. 

Logic suggested that Beelzebub wouldn’t have offered Aziraphale a job if they knew of their lie, or were at all suspicious. Or maybe they would have— Aziraphale’s numbers  _ are _ excellent after all— but they wouldn’t have done so without saying  _ anything _ . But Crowley’s nerves, frayed from the events of last night and the fact that they seem to have steadfastly agreed, unspoken of course,  _ not _ to talk about it, can’t really sign up for logic right now. So he feels like each step is dragging him closer to his doom.

“Close the door.” Beelzebub says as they take their spot behind their desk. 

The office looks more like them now. There’s still nothing horribly personal— no pictures or plants or anything of the like— but it had a sense of being lived in and the style fit Beelzebub well. It no longer felt like it had ever been Ligur’s office, it felt like it did and always had belonged to Beelzebub. 

Crowley does as he’s instructed and shuts the door behind him, shoving his hands in his pockets as Aziraphale takes a seat nervously. 

The tension in the room seems to come to a head, threatening to suffocate both him and Aziraphale. He can see it in Aziraphale’s face, in the tense set of his shoulders as he tries his hardest not to run his hands up and down his legs in his typical anxious gesture.

There’s a long moment of silence before Crowley finally caves. “Is everything alright?”

“I want both of you to write.” Beelzebub jumps right in with no preamble, scanning both of their faces. There’s the ghost of a smile at the edge of their lips, no doubt from the vague introduction but it at least starts to take the edges of Crowley’s singed nerves and soothe them somewhat. 

“Alright?” Crowley replies, taking a step closer to where Aziraphale is seated. There is another chair there, one he’s meant to occupy but he doesn’t feel ready to sit down yet. “We  _ are  _ writers—“

“ _ Together _ .”

The word hits hard and Crowley thinks his jaw might be on the floor. He’s not entirely sure, he can’t tear his wide eyed gaze off of Beelzebub long enough to look.

“I’m sorry?” Aziraphale finally manages to choke out, his voice reflecting the shock Crowley was feeling. At least he was able to say  _ something _ because Crowley is fairly certain that he never would’ve gotten there if it had been left up to him. 

“Listen,” Beelzebub clasps their hands together on top of their desk and leans back in their chair. It’s probably meant to look casual but there’s always the tiniest bit of threatening undertone to everything Beelzebub does. “I know you’ve both expressed that you’d never want to write together—“

“Yes…” Aziraphale sounds put out now. 

Crowley doesn’t think he’s ever actually outright expressed that notion. Previous to the last month, he would have absolutely agreed that writing with Aziraphale was fairly high up on his avoidance list. But after working with Aziraphale for a month and getting to learn his process and the way he works, Crowley doesn’t think it’ll be so bad. He’s not surprised that Aziraphale had apparently put that desire— or lack thereof— into explicit words. The idea of it almost makes Crowley smile a little. Predictable Aziraphale. 

“But you’re the two most popular writers at  _ Hellfire _ . I’d be an idiot not to have you two write together.” Beelzebub finishes as if Aziraphale hadn’t spoken at all. 

Crowley finally gives in and sinks into the free seat next to Aziraphale, crossing his arms over his chest instead. “So be an idiot, then.”

Beelzebub shoots daggers at him with a glare that’s honestly more intimidating than Crowley wants to admit. “It’s not forever. It’s just one assignment.”

At this point, Aziraphale finally turns to look at Crowley, his eyes wide. Crowley glances back at him and he reads the question in Aziraphale’s gaze, knows what he’s thinking. Neither of them like it and certainly neither one would admit it aloud, but they’re at Beelzebub’s mercy to some extent. If they want to keep Beelzebub happy and avoid any prying eyes into their lie, they need to go with the flow. Disruption is the fastest way to draw attention. And if they  _ did  _ get found out before they had a chance to figure out how they were going to handle everything, well, it wouldn’t hurt to be on Beelzebub’s good side. 

With an exaggerated sigh, Crowley gives Aziraphale the tiniest nod and turns back to Beelzebub. “What’s the assignment?”

Beelzebub smiles back, a little victorious but mostly genuine and Crowley thinks, not for the first time, that Beelzebub really isn’t that bad. A bit intimidating, sure, but genuinely nice underneath it, Crowley thinks. At least, in the few rare glimpses Beelzebub shows that aren’t intimidating, they seem nice. “Christmas!”

“I’m sorry—“ Aziraphale leans forward in his chair, hands clasped together in his lap. “What?”

“I’ve been working on this for a few weeks, actually.” Beelzebub begins to explain. “Thinking what you two could write together that would unite your readerships. It wasn’t easy at first but then I realized— Christmas! Everybody loves Christmas—“

“I don’t.” Crowley interjects which is at least partially true. Christmas is just too much of a hassle. It’s explosions of glitter and crowded malls and lights that somehow always manage to burn out at least once before the blasted holiday itself. 

Beelzebub remains entirely undeterred. “On top of that, people really love a good love story at Christmas. And you  _ are  _ married so I figured there couldn’t be a better topic to debut your joint writing!” 

There’s a deafening pause that follows the words while Beelzebub waits for them to react. Crowley, for his part, is just trying to make sense of what he’s been told and what is suddenly being expected of him. If he’s being honest, Crowley had figured something like this was inevitable. The world had a particular sense of humor and this seemed to align perfectly with the rest of his life and his relationship with Aziraphale. This, like all the rest of it, was something Crowley had no trouble considering a cruel joke. 

At least, he reasons to himself, this means that Beelzebub is believing strongly in their lie and not at all suspicious. That is a small victory.

Crowley’s mind whispers to him that it’d be hard  _ not _ to believe in it considering how little of it actually feels like a lie anymore but this is definitely  _ not _ the time to be having thoughts like that.

“Alright…” Aziraphale begins, the first one to collect his thoughts. “I suppose writing one article together wouldn’t be so bad. I’m sure we can navigate it.”

“Right.” Crowley agrees, glancing at Aziraphale, They need to form a united front, to be on the same page. “Sure, yeah, we could do that.”

“Well here’s the thing,” Beelzebub slides their hands off of their desk and into their lap and Crowley doesn’t like the way the air in the room seems to shift in response. “It’s not just one article.”

It feels like all the blood in Crowley’s veins is replaced with ice. “How many?”

Truthfully, Crowley didn’t have a reason to dislike this assignment other than the fact that it was clearly going to be extra work. He and Aziraphale had not yet sorted out how they were going to get out of this mess, and he was fairly certain that they weren’t going to sort it out by Christmas since that was a mere two weeks away. If the deadline for this assignment was Christmas, it didn’t  _ really _ change anything. It wasn’t like Crowley had a reason to avoid it, it wasn’t like he had a reason to hesitate on doing something stereotypically romantic.

He couldn’t say for sure that this new task required stereotypical romance but given the fact that Beelzebub had used their marriage as one of their reasons, Crowley figured it was a safe bet to make. He tended to jump to conclusions from time to time but he was certain that he’d landed on something solid here. 

And honestly, what were a few extra articles? Crowley could crank articles out in his sleep. If that’s really all it required, he could do that. And then he and Aziraphale could talk… eventually. But a part of Crowley, a part that isn’t sure if it’s elated or terrified, realizes that this talk can’t happen until at least Christmas now. Because if Crowley says the things he wants to say, if the name for that emotion comes up— and it’s certainly been trying to ever since it had appeared last night— it could ruin this whole wretched thing and he couldn’t afford to do that in the middle of a joint assignment. 

Crowley takes in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. One crisis at a time, he tells himself. Listen to his new assignment now and deal with the looming uncertainty of his actual relationship with Aziraphale, not this fake marriage that they’re hiding behind but his  _ actual _ relationship, whatever title that should have, later. 

Beelzebub hesitates for just a moment, just the length of one heartbeat pounding against Crowley’s ribs. “Twelve.”

“ _ Twelve _ ?” Aziraphale nearly jumps out of his seat at the sheer idea of it. “You want us to write twelve articles between now and Christmas?”

“That’s one a day.” Beelzebub points out, gaze settling on Crowley. He knows what’s going to be said before the words even come out of their mouth. “Crowley’s been maintaining that average for years. And of course any other article assignments you have currently will be dropped until after the holiday.”

Crowley can feel Aziraphale’s brain short-circuiting from beside him as he tries to comprehend this idea. He had struggled with maintaining a rate of one article a  _ week _ in the last month. One article a day wasn’t even in Aziraphale’s wildest imaginations Crowley assumed. It was true, though, that this was the kind of schedule Crowley had held himself to for years with the occasional exception. He could very easily write twelve articles between now and Christmas if he were left on his own to do so. But to involve Aziraphale—

Well, it wasn’t that Crowley was unwilling to work with Aziraphale. He knew Aziraphale and his writing process well enough by now. It was just a matter of taming Aziraphale’s inner critic and teaching him when something was  _ good enough _ . And more importantly, it was teaching him that  _ good enough _ was acceptable and they didn’t have to scrutinize the damn thing until it met some arbitrary standard of  _ perfect _ .

“So one article a day starting…?”

“First article posts tomorrow.” Beelzebub answers. “Last article posts on Christmas day.”

“So we have to write our first joint article… tonight. You’re giving us a few  _ hours _ notice on the fact that we’re collaborating?” Crowley bites back the frustrated tone that he can feel building up in the back of this throat, reminding himself that it’s really not that big of a deal.

“Well I wasn’t sure until yesterday that Aziraphale would still be on the team for this idea.” Beelzebub answers. “And if you recall, you  _ did _ just walk out of the office last night, taking away any chance I had of mentioning it to you then.”

Well, fuck. Crowley can’t argue with that. He  _ had _ damn near dragged Aziraphale out of the office yesterday. Crowley grinds his teeth and clenches his hands into fists. He was elated about carrying on the lie, about living their life the way they’ve been living it for the last few weeks. But something about this sat wrong in his chest, beat an irregular rhythm against his ribs.

“Aright, fine. Thirteen articles. Why the fuck not, yeah? What are the topics?” He tries to sound casual, to sound like any disgruntled emotions he has are just because of the sudden change in his assignments and the short notice. He tries, but he isn’t sure he succeeds.

“Have you heard of the twelve days of Christmas?” Beelzebub asks, ignoring any hidden emotions in Crowley’s voice. In the short time that they’ve known each other, Beelzebub has proven an impeccable ability to take Crowley’s attitude completely in stride. 

Aziraphale seems to find this a neutral enough topic that he feels comfortable once again joining the fray. “Of course.”

“Sure.” Crowley affirms, trying to find some sort of footing. “Bunch of birds and shit.”

“Charming.” Aziraphale murmurs in his general direction, the eye roll he’s holding back practically palpable to Crowley. “So romantic.”

“It  _ is _ a bunch of birds and shit, isn’t it?”

“That’s not the point!”

“What’s the point then, hm?”

“It’s about giving to the person you  _ love _ —”

“You don’t give half a fucking zoo to the person you love, angel. That’s more suited for your enemies!”

“You just don’t understand.”

Crowley leans forward to catch Aziraphale’s gaze. “Are you telling me you want me to buy you a fuckton of birds for Christmas? Is that what you’re saying?”

The words are out of his mouth before he can stop them and the implication of them hits him like a slap to the face. Crowley stills in his chair, the world screeching to a halt alongside his brain. Aziraphale, blessedly, oblivious as ever, doesn’t seem to pick up on what Crowley had said. Or perhaps in the context of the conversation he just doesn’t realize what it could mean, doesn’t consider it as anything more than an extension of their ordeal, doesn’t know that Crowley’s heart is thundering wildly in his chest because it’s the first time he’s breathed life into that word, even if he didn’t say it directly. It’s just part of the act, just part of their lie in front of Beelzebub, not something serious.

And that’s exactly what it is, Crowley tells himself. He was arguing with his husband in front of their boss, it would’ve been weird to handle it any other way. It would’ve blown their cover if he had hesitated and changed track part way through. Yes, this was just instinctual, a means of protecting them both. 

“A  _ fuckton _ of birds, as you eloquently put it, wouldn’t be the worst possible gift you could get me.” Aziraphale sniffs, tilting his chin up just the tiniest bit higher.

“That’s just bullshit.” Crowley recovers some of his wits, the audacity and ridiculousness of Aziraphale’s statement drawing him back to the moment at hand.

“Do watch your language, darling.”

“ _ You _ just said fuckton!”

There’s a laugh that startles both of them out of their argument and Crowley whips his head around. Beelzebub is watching them, eyes delighted as they laugh at the absurd scene before them. Crowley hadn’t exactly  _ forgotten _ that Beelzebub was there but it may have temporarily… slipped his mind. 

“This is exactly the kind of energy I want you to bring to your articles.” They comment as Crowley and Aziraphale both shrink back into their respective seats as if chastised. “This is why I want you two to write together. You have these differing opinions that will make for interesting articles. The give and take is just— it’s really something to witness. You guys do not seem like you should work together at all but you  _ do _ , like you’re meant to be together and the readers will  _ love  _ it.”

“Yeah, well—” Crowley isn’t sure what to say because his heart is currently trying to break through the cage of his ribs entirely. He’s not sure where it’s trying to go but he knows it’s racing far too fast to stay here. Perhaps it’s trying to go to Aziraphale, to take up its desired home nestled in his chest.

Beelzebub shakes their head and it’s the first time Crowley has seen them look even a little bit fond. “Just thirteen articles. One a day. I’ve already got the topics all picked out for you.”

“Is one of our articles on  _ birds and shit? _ ” Aziraphale asks haughtily, glancing at Crowley out of the corner of his eye.

“Language,  _ darling _ .” Crowley snaps back.

Beelzebub allows them an extra moment but both of them settle, neither one scrambling to continue their spat. With them reigned back in properly, Beelzebub reaches into a drawer in their desk and pulls out what appears to be a handwritten list. They place it on the top of the desk and upside down, Crowley can’t read any of what it says but it’s not looking particularly promising.

“I ran a poll on the site.” Beelzebub begins, “of the most popular holiday activities. I wanted to pick twelve of them and to have you write an article on each.”

“So we’re making our own twelve days of Christmas?” Aziraphale has a far off look that Crowley recognizes. He’s clearly thinking through this information and forming some mental image of how he expects these articles to look.

“Exactly. And I’ve already got the series title selected: Twelve Days of Falling In Love.” Beelzebub points at Aziraphale to indicate that he’d gotten the point. “We’ve selected twelve things that are holiday related. I want you to do them  _ together _ and then to write an article about your experience doing it. This isn’t typical writing for either of you. I want it to be personal, to be a glimpse into your lives. Nothing too drastic, of course, I respect your privacy. But I want  _ emotions _ , I want  _ photos _ , I want  _ holiday spirit _ .”

“I don’t do emotions or holiday spirit.” Crowley raises a hand as he speaks to emphasize his point. 

“You do now.” Beelzebub responds firmly. 

Crowley groans and drops his head back against his shoulders, gaze staring up at the ceiling above him. “ _ Fine _ . What blasted festive things are you subjecting me to?”

Instead of answering, Beelzebub just pushes the list across the desk.

* * *

“It’s really not as bad as you’re making it out to be.” Aziraphale chastises as he and Crowley exit the building and head for the Bentley. “You won’t combust if you do something festive.”

“How certain are you of that?” Crowley fires back. “Are you certain enough that you’re willing to risk my life?”

“I am.” Aziraphale replies evenly, taking the wind right out of Crowley’s sails.

The list is clutched in Aziraphale’s hand as he slides into the passenger seat, scanning across the sloppy handwriting for what had to be at least the tenth time. The list of things they were to complete were indeed stereotypical holiday things. It was like every bad Christmas movie trope listed on one sheet of paper. Crowley felt itchy just thinking about having to do some of them.

“Let’s just organize the stupid thing and start getting it over with. How d’you want to do the writing? Do you want me to write and you can do a read-through and edit or add your own bits after?” Crowley slams the door to the Bentley shut and twists the key with expert ease, the engine roaring to life. “That way you get the final word.”

“You don’t have to say it like that.” Aziraphale tuts, disgruntled.

“I don’t mean anything by it.” Crowley amends. “I just think that’d be the easiest.”

Aziraphale regards the list again. Beelzebub really did not give them sufficient time to plan any of this. If they had to get started  _ today _ , they had maybe six hours to knock something off the list, write the entire article and turn it in for proofreading. It was such a quick turn around time that Aziraphale wasn’t even confident that he’d be able to enjoy whatever activity they chose. 

The truth was that Aziraphale loved Christmas, he always had. It was one of his favorite holidays. He loved the cheer that spread through the city, loved the twinkling lights and the way there seemed to be magic floating in the air. Everything was better at Christmas, warmer and happier. Christmas had the ability to soften anyone and Aziraphale had no doubt that it would soften even someone as callous as Crowley.

After all, Crowley was starting to soften all on his own these past few weeks. His rough edges had been smoothing out, turning into something gentler. He seemed to have his hackles up today for some reason but Aziraphale was confident that he could soothe him back down to a level of comfort and they could progress from there. He was determined to make this an enjoyable experience, to show Crowley the true magic of Christmas.

“Yes, I rather agree. I think that would be the easiest.” Aziraphale folds the list delicately and places it into one of the pockets of his jacket, tucking it tenderly against his chest and patting the outside of his coat to assure he could feel it there. “If you don’t mind. I don’t want to force the majority of the work on you.”

“Quite alright, angel.” Crowley navigates through the streets easily, the Bentley maintaining the speed they had managed to compromise on. “S’like Beelzebub said, this is my normal writing schedule, I don’t mind.”

“I don’t know how you do it.” Aziraphale murmurs. “I could never write that fast.”

There’s a wry twist to the corner of Crowley’s mouth that makes Aziraphale feel a little better, his heart constricting in his chest. “You’re a perfectionist.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“No,” Crowley glances at him, his glasses slipping far enough down his nose that Aziraphale can see his beautiful eyes. “I say that like you don’t get to be a perfectionist this time. We’re going for  _ passable _ here, angel, not perfect.”

Aziraphale huffs. He knows that Crowley is right because they don’t have time for perfect. Aziraphale also doesn’t know what perfect would look like in this instance. There’s no facts for him to check, no research for him to do. These articles were meant to be based on feeling, on the experience of each thing on this list. If Aziraphale were being honest, he was a little worried since emotion wasn’t something he did well and was something he was currently wrestling with. 

He wasn’t sure how they were going to write a single word of these articles because he didn’t know what they were supposed to look or sound like. Aziraphale doesn’t do well with little structure like this.

“Yes, alright, fine. The Twelve Days of Falling in Love only has to be passable.” Aziraphale agrees because this isn’t a battle he wants to pick. Especially not with Crowley all riled up. “What an interesting series name, though, don’t you think?”

“How d’you mean?”

“Well, we’re meant to already  _ be _ in love, aren’t we? Married people aren’t  _ falling _ in love.”

Crowley’s hands grip the wheel so tightly that his knuckles turn white. “Right, ‘course, good point. Desperately in love already, that’s us. Besotted fools, all that.”

“Crowley—”

Crowley takes in a deep breath and lets it out and Aziraphale feels the way he shakes with it. “Sorry, angel. Just— holidays haven’t really been my thing since— since  _ before _ .”

Aziraphale understands without Crowley having to elaborate further but he knows there’s more to the issue at hand than just this. He can feel the underlying tension simmering just below the surface, can see the way Crowley’s other foot is jiggling nervously.

Aziraphale reaches out and puts a gentle hand on Crowley’s knee to still the motion and immediately feels warm to his very core with flashbacks from the night before. “Darling,” he says around his rapidly closing throat and Crowley sucks a breath in through his teeth. “I’m not thrilled about writing articles so quickly, but I am very happy to be spending this holiday with you. There— there isn’t anyone else I’d rather be spending it with.”

One of Crowley’s hands leaves the wheel and lands on top of Aziraphale’s, their fingers tangling together. “I feel the same, angel. Just got a little spooked, is all.”

“I thought you  _ liked _ spooky?” Aziraphale teases and Crowley groans in response, going to pull his hand away. Aziraphale holds tight and draws Crowley’s hand across the space between them, pressing a gentle kiss to the palm of his hand. “Let’s just get home and make a plan, shall we? It’ll get easier from there.”

Crowley seems soothed, not seeming to notice the way Aziraphale had referred to Crowley’s flat as  _ home _ . He tries not to think about it much himself, not right now anyways. They can discuss it all… sometime.

“Alright.” Crowley agrees, pulling their conjoined hands back to his lap as he makes the final turn towards his flat. “Let’s do this. Twelve days of obnoxiously in love holiday cheer.”

“That’s the spirit.” Aziraphale teases gently, his own heart pounding at the thought.

“Probably better if we stick together though. So I can run ideas by you before I write them.” Crowley glances at him again and the tension in his shoulders is still a little more than Aziraphale would like. “And I tend to write late into the night, so…”

“Well then,” Aziraphale watches as Crowley’s flat appears before them, the building growing taller by the second. “I think we’re about to spend a lot of time together.”

“Seems like it.” Crowley navigates into his usual parking spot, a hint of a smile appearing on his lips. “Now c’mon. Can I tempt you with some hot chocolate while we figure out what to do?”

“I’d love some.” Aziraphale agrees as he steps out of the car and trails Crowley inside. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For today, Crowley’s hoping to get away with just some photos of the houses, maybe a photo of Aziraphale in front of one of them. He’s willing to push his limits a bit, to test the true strength of the boundaries and to go as long as he possibly can without being in the photos. So idle down the street it is, because Aziraphale has already been given clear instructions to take photos. That was their deal: Crowley drives and Aziraphale photographs. 
> 
> But Aziraphale, apparently, has another idea. “Can we park here?”
> 
> “I— yeah?” Crowley turns to look at him, eyebrows drawing together in confusion. “I suppose so. Why?”
> 
> Aziraphale is practically glowing under the brilliant lights, looking every bit of the angel Crowley is learning him to be. When he’d started using that as a nickname years ago, he’d had no idea how apt it was. “Let’s walk the street. I want to see it all up close.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay listen, LISTEN. I KNOW THIS CHAPTER IS ALMOST 6K, OKAY? I KNOW. DO NOT GET USED TO THAT! This is the only chapter I already had written so the rest still don't exist. I CANNOT write 6k a day for the next 11 days and also write chapter 9 of Curve. Consider this being SPOILED because I can't do it again. I SWEAR the chapter lengths are going to shorten!!!
> 
> That being said, please enjoy day one which is a lot of Crowley having a pretty big gay panic amongst some pretty Christmas lights.

Two mugs of hot cocoa later, they had laid out a game plan. 

Considering that Beelzebub had given them little to no notice whatsoever, they were limited on options for where to start. Beelzebub had let them keep the list, insisting that they would know if something from the list was missed. Crowley and Aziraphale had scanned it and realized immediately that very few of them were possible to perform after work with zero preemptive planning. The only logical thing they could do on such short notice was to bundle up and head out to look at Christmas lights. There was a neighborhood about twenty minutes outside the heart of the city that was notorious for their Christmas decorations. Every house in the neighborhood participated and each year the neighborhood as a whole picked a theme for everyone to decorate to. Crowley had heard of it more than once over the years but he’d never bothered going.

Aziraphale, somehow, had never heard of it.

For all that he loved Christmas, Aziraphale was too work oriented, Crowley had realized. In the time that they had known each other, Crowley wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen Aziraphale take a day off. He hadn’t ever spent a Christmas with Aziraphale before, but he could just imagine that Aziraphale had given the holiday season about an hour out of every day and then maybe half of the actual day of Christmas, nothing more. 

It was an interesting thing to consider because Aziraphale openly admitted that Christmas was his favorite holiday. He’d been practically chomping at the bit to get to decorating and it had only been taken off the list of possibilities for today because they’d decided to do everything at Crowley’s flat and Crowley had exactly zero decorations. Aziraphale was willing to bring all of his over to Crowley’s since he’d be spending at least two weeks here and so it had been moved onto the agenda for tomorrow. 

Crowley could tell that Aziraphale felt genuine excitement towards the idea of decorating but he seemed determined to rush it, to get it over with so he could simply check it off of his list but Crowley wouldn’t allow that. If Christmas was Aziraphale’s favorite holiday, Crowley was determined to make it his best Christmas ever. 

And so this year, Crowley wanted to try and allow Aziraphale to enjoy the season. Hell, even Crowley took time off during the holidays over the years. It wasn’t for any reason other than to get a break from his unrelenting schedule, but the point remained that everyone in the world— except for Aziraphale, apparently— took time off for Christmas. And now they were handed this assignment with a deadline that was right in Crowley’s wheelhouse. He could manage the bulk of the article writing, leaving Aziraphale to just enjoy their holiday tasks and to actually experience Christmas for once.

It didn’t even bother him that he wasn’t going to be getting a break over the holidays like he usually did. What mattered this year was that it was  _ Aziraphale  _ getting the break. 

And in truth, he was getting a bit of a break. Since all of their other assignments had been pushed off until after the holiday, Beelzebub had given them permission to stay out of the office for nearly the entire duration of this assignment. So yes, Crowley was still writing daily articles. But he was also out of the office, spending all day every day with Aziraphale. It may not strictly be a break from work but it was already shaping up to be the best Christmas season of his life— and certainly one that he would never forget. 

When Crowley had told Aziraphale about the neighborhood and insisted on taking them there because he knew Aziraphale would love it, Aziraphale’s eyes had  _ twinkled _ . And yeah that was stupidly cliche but there really was no other way to explain the look in his eyes as he listened to Crowley describe it. 

The twinkling had been so strong that it hadn’t even dimmed as Crowley had stumbled through a terrible description, the words attempting to stick in his dry throat. His heart had been pounding a new beat against his ribs as Aziraphale had reached for him, gently brushing his hair away from his eyes and commenting on how much it meant to him that Crowley paid such close attention to him. 

Crowley, for his part, had nearly died on the spot and stammered out something about how they needed to hurry if they wanted to make it before the crowd, if Aziraphale found anything off about his behavior, he didn’t say it. He just kissed Crowley sweetly and stood up to start putting on what had to be at least five jackets.

“I don’t think you need  _ that _ many layers, angel.” Crowley comments from where he’s standing in the doorway of Aziraphale’s flat, watching the man button up yet  _ another _ layer. His throat is still dry but the ridiculousness of Aziraphale wrapped in so many pieces of fabric fills him with a swell of fondness that softens the knot in his stomach and soothes the shaking of his hands. 

Aziraphale glances up at him, the hint of a glare in the lines at the corners of his eyes. It’s not malicious— partially because Aziraphale simply doesn’t mean for it to be and Crowley is certain of that and partially because nothing he does could possibly look threatening when he’s dressed like that. “I just want to be certain that I’m warm.”

“We’ll be in the car.” Crowley protests, propping his shoulder against the wall and crossing his arms over his chest. He thinks maybe he can hold it together like that, stop his heart from overflowing into the space between them but when Aziraphale meets his gaze, he knows that it will never work. “She does have a heater, you know.”

“ _ I know _ .” Aziraphale fires back as he does up the last button and straightens out the collar of his coat, his chin held high. “I have ridden in her before.”

Crowley decides to forego any scathing remark in response to that, mostly because he knows that it wouldn’t actually be scathing at all. Ever since their little…  _ encounter  _ the other day, Crowley had felt like he’d lost his edge. Everything Aziraphale did drove him maddeningly insane and he couldn’t stop thinking about it, replaying it in his mind. That newly named emotion was right there, nagging at him every single second of the day, refusing to go unnoticed. 

He could no longer shove it down, bury it deep, turn a blind eye to it. It was there and it was  _ determined  _ to find its way out into the open. 

Somewhere inside of him he knew that Anathema was right. The witch could probably feel it, jumping with glee wherever she was at his internal admission. She’d been telling him for years that the only real way to get a handle on an emotion was to acknowledge it and deal with it head on. Crowley had never listened to her but it was mostly because he’d never had a feeling like this— never had one that refused to be left alone. 

But acknowledging it— that was terrifying. That was opening himself up to even worse pain than the scars of his past. No, he couldn’t do that, couldn’t breathe life into its lungs. It would just take a couple days and he’d once again be able to look at Aziraphale without feeling like the foundation of who he was at his core was shaking apart underneath his feet. A few days and he’d be back to snide remarks and a dynamic he recognized. 

“Right, ‘course.” He shoves off the door frame and steps to the side to pull the door open, jamming the thoughts deep down inside of him, in that box he never intends to look at but will undoubtedly be  _ forced _ to look at sometime soon seeing as it’s starting to overflow. “Shall we?”

Aziraphale graces him with one long, scrutinizing look before finally giving in and cracking a smile. He slides his hand through Crowley’s arm, his hand resting comfortably in the crook of Crowley’s elbow. There’s a teasing edge to his smile that suggests that he knows that Crowley hadn’t been able to come up with a comeback. He probably did, the bastard. Aziraphale has had his number from the very beginning, after all. Crowley tries not to think about  _ that _ either. 

It’s a joke, really, the way  _ not _ thinking about something forces him to think about it. He spends all of his time telling himself to  _ not _ think about Aziraphale and all it accomplishes is getting Aziraphale on his mind constantly. There’s no reprieve from it. But if he doesn’t dedicate his energy to trying to avoid these thoughts, he knows that they’ll come. It’s a lose-lose situation.

No matter what he thinks about, it somehow circles back to Aziraphale. He briefly wonders if that’ll go away when this whole thing is over— whenever the fuck  _ that _ ends up being since they have no immediate plan other than to play the happy husbands through the holidays. 

They make it through the building and reach the lobby when Aziraphale stops dead in his tracks. Crowley nearly trips over his own feet with how abrupt it is and only barely manages to stumble his way around Aziraphale ungracefully. He looks at Aziraphale, about to ask him what’s up when he notices Aziraphale’s fixed gaze. Following it, Crowley sees that it’s snowing outside— the big kind of fluffy snowflakes that float to the ground, cutting intricate dances across the sky before finally settling with their siblings. They fall lazily down, a gentle reminder of the season. 

It’s the kind of snow that’s beautiful. And perfectly Christmas.

And definitely romantic too, his mind supplies because, as it turns out, his mind loves to torture him.

“Well,” Crowley says when Aziraphale continues to stare without saying or moving in the slightest, his mouth slightly parted in awe. “That’s a thing.”

“It’s going to make the lights look so  _ beautiful _ .” Azirraphale finally murmurs, rushing for the door. 

Crowley trails him, catching the door before it can slam shut. Aziraphale steps out into the snow, a hand out in front of him with his palm up as if he’s trying to catch the flakes. They do land in his palm but they melt almost immediately, the warmth that is Aziraphale too much for them. Crowley can relate to that but he refuses to allow himself to. Aziraphale turns to Crowley with his eyes wide and a giant smile on his face.

“Didn’t know you’d get this excited about snow.” Crowley comments, trying to drag his train of thought back to the present and steer it far, far away from thoughts about Aziraphale’s warmth and  _ why _ he knows about it. 

“Don’t you get it?” Aziraphale, amazingly, seems entirely unaware of Crowley’s internal struggles and that, at least, is a small gift. ‘Tis the season for gifts and all that. 

“Er— no. Not really. S’just wet. And cold.”

“It feels like Christmas!” Aziraphale cries, pulling his hand back and reaching out to put it on Crowley’s shoulder. “It’s not a  _ real _ Christmas unless there’s snow on the ground. Oh, now it’s officially Christmas season! How wonderful!”

As much as Crowley tends to think of snow as just cold and unfashionable boots, he does have to agree that it doesn’t feel like Christmas to him, either, if he there isn’t snow on the ground. There’s something about it that just completes the scene that Christmas sets, something about it that feels like coming full circle. He may not love the snow, but he would like a Christmas without snow even less, he’s certain. 

“Right, well, shall we go see those lights in the snow then?” Crowley offers after a moment.

In truth, Christmas has never been his thing. He doesn’t  _ dislike _ it, it’s a perfectly fine holiday. It’s just one he has never made a big deal about. His family had celebrated when he was younger but when he’d grown up and moved out, he’d ended up too far away to go back and celebrate. And honestly, decorating was  _ a lot _ of work. And not worth the payoff. Hours of labor just to have glitter covering every surface? Absolutely not. Crowley had a certain style and it was distinctly glitter-free.

Aziraphale, on the other hand, seemed to have that deep-running, genuine love for Christmas. The kind of cliche love that told Crowley that Aziraphale spent  _ hours _ decorating, even if he had to spread it out over days to fit around his work schedule. He probably even stood outside the stores ringing one of those bells to help get donations. He probably had a  _ collection _ of Christmas jumpers. Aziraphale seemed to be the kind of person who didn’t just embrace Crhistmas but wrapped himself in it completely until there wasn’t room for anything else— besides work, of course, which Crowley was starting to think was a core part of Aziraphales DNA— in his life until December 26th. 

They clamber into the car together and Crowley turns her on. It only takes a few minutes for her to warm up to a comfortable temperature and in those few minutes, Crowley makes a point of hiding the fact that it’s colder than he anticipated. He will  _ not _ let Aziraphale hear his teeth chattering. He can already imagine the smug look Aziraphale would have in response to that. The mental image alone is patronising enough, he doesn’t need or want to see the real thing. Luckily, it doesn’t take too long before the warm air is blasting him through the vents that he had perfectly set up ages ago to blow directly on where his hands grip the steering wheel for this very reason. 

The drive isn’t as terrible as Crowley anticipated. The neighborhood is well known for its decorations— Crowley had written an article on them a few years back, actually— so he expected the traffic to be backed up nearly to the city, if not into it. They’re lucky, though, and make it all the way there without hardly seeing another car at all. There’s no traffic stopping them, no line of people they have to sift through. It’s just smooth sailing— so much so that Crowley is even able to bend the boundaries of the speed limit a little, dirty look from Aziraphale included. He supposes it must be because the holiday itself is still over a week away because there’s no other explanation he can think of.

To be fair, he hadn’t gone to see it himself a few years ago. The company had sent a photographer and Crowley had just interviewed random people about it. Since it was so popular, it had been easy to find people willing to talk about it. So technically he didn’t know if there was a massive amount of traffic every year, he just assumed.

Aziraphale is quiet most of the drive, a wistful gaze directed out the window. He seems to be watching the snow fall in elegant patterns outside the window as it doesn’t lighten up even the tiniest bit when they move away from the city. Occasionally Aziraphale would point something out to Crowley, exclaiming about the beauty of some Christmas decoration, glancing over to make sure that Crowley had looked in the brief moment before it was gone. Crowley could work with it, could handle the silence that was almost companionable at this point.

It was getting harder with each passing day to lie to himself.

Because the silence  _ was _ companionable. It was easy to sit with Aziraphale next to him, nothing but the sounds of the radio filling the car. It was comfortable— Crowley didn’t feel the need to stutter out some half sentences to fill the silence, didn’t feel the creeping awkwardness that could ruin the moment. He was perfectly content to drive out to this neighborhood with Aziraphale quietly next to him. He wasn’t much for Christmas but he honestly couldn’t think of many better ways to spend his than this and that spoke volumes. 

Just a few days ago, Crowley would have been fine to call it companionable, and would've been able to say the word while simultaneously ignoring the implications of it. But now that they’d—  _ crossed that line _ , Crowley couldn’t think of things casually anymore. A companionable silence was more than just that— it was the glue repairing the cracks in his heart, the comfort that soothed the jagged edges of his soul. It was so much more now. It was something he  _ loved _ . 

“Oh, there it is!” Aziraphale breathes, his hand coming to land on Crowley’s knee as if Crowley can’t see the bright block of lights ahead of him. As if Crowley hasn’t been the one staring out the windshield the entire time, the one actively  _ looking for _ it to make sure that he didn’t pass it. 

As if he didn’t know that his hand on Crowley’s knee was going to make his stomach clench desperately as the memories of what happened last time Aziraphale did this to him flooded his mind.

The neighborhood is still at least a mile away but it’s impossible to miss. It glows in the dark cover of the night, lighting the snowflakes up like flakes of glitter. It’s beautiful, even from a distance where it’s mostly just a mass of lights— impossible to tell anything distinctive about it. The overwhelming majority of the lights appear to be the classic white but there are definitely spots of red and green and even a few multi colored patches. It’s not until they get closer that Crowley is able to identify what everything is.

He pulls over at the entrance of the neighborhood, planning to simply allow Aziraphale time to take it all in. It’s a lot to see at once and it honestly seems to require a dedicated amount of time, a chance to observe each house individually to see all the finer details of it. His plan is to essentially just idle down the street, stopping in front of any house that Aziraphale wants to take a closer look at.

Beelzebub has given strict instructions that pictures are to accompany each and every post they make in the next twelve days and given some not-so-subtle hints that they’re meant to include themselves in these photos, too. Crowley doesn’t love the idea— partially because he hates being in photos and partially because they’ve both been careful to tiptoe the line in their writing that doesn’t outright say they’re not married but doesn’t explicitly state that they  _ are _ either. The last thing they need is the whole  _ world _ to be aware of their lie. There’d be no easy way to disentangle themselves at that point— not that an easy way was presenting itself currently.

For today, Crowley’s hoping to get away with just some photos of the houses, maybe a photo of Aziraphale in front of one of them. He’s willing to push his limits a bit, to test the true strength of the boundaries and to go as long as he possibly can without being in the photos. So idle down the street it is, because Aziraphale has already been given clear instructions to take photos. That was their deal: Crowley drives and Aziraphale photographs. 

But Aziraphale, apparently, has another idea. “Can we park here?”

“I— yeah?” Crowley turns to look at him, eyebrows drawing together in confusion. “I suppose so. Why?”

Aziraphale is practically glowing under the brilliant lights, looking every bit of the angel Crowley is learning him to be. When he’d started using that as a nickname years ago, he’d had no idea how apt it was. “Let’s walk the street. I want to see it all up close.”

There’s no way for Crowley to say no without admitting that Aziraphale had been the one in the right with all of his layers and Crowley was  _ not _ about to say that out loud. So he gives some sort of gesture that lands between a shrug and a nod and maneuvers the Bentley far enough over that he can legally park. Once she’s situated, he pulls the keys out and glances at Aziraphale again who is already climbing out of the car and adjusting his scarf around his neck.

Crowley climbs out too, shutting his door and locking the car before burying the key deep in his pocket along with his hands. His torso and legs are alright with the temperature, but his hands and his face will freeze in a matter of minutes, he thinks. He spares one quick second to zip his jacket all the way up to his throat before once again removing his hands from the cold and taking his post next to Aziraphale. He’s a lot of things and infuriatingly stubborn is definitely among them.

They stand side by side for a moment, just taking in the street before them. It really is impressive. There are some houses that are so covered in lights, Crowley can’t even see the brick that lies underneath. The theme this year had been declared to be ‘Winter Wonderland’ and it seemed to show through in the elegance of the neighborhood. The houses were outlined starkly and there seemed to be a theme of snowflakes as well which just hit the nail a little too closely on the head, Crowley thought. 

“Oh,” Aziraphale breathes and he takes a step a little closer to Crowley, “It’s  _ lovely _ . I can’t believe I’ve never been.”

“I can’t believe it, either.” Crowley replies, trying very, very hard not to think about how warm Aziraphale would be if he just sank into him right now.

He turns to look at Aziraphale, intending to follow that statement up with something more but the breath is stolen right out of his lungs. It’s not the cold that does it, it’s the way the light catches on Aziraphale’s hair, making his curls glow gold like a halo above his head. It’s the way the light catches the bridge of his nose, outlining his profile and making him look ethereal. It’s the goddamn way his blue eyes are glowing with happiness as he takes in the scene before him, hands clenched together over his heart like he’s committing every second of what is happening to memory. It’s  _ Aziraphale _ that punches the breath right out of him and for a moment, Crowley doesn’t even feel the cold.

Without a warning, but with a glance over his shoulder to make sure Crowley is still coming, Aziraphale starts down the street. He takes each step slowly, pausing in front of every house to look at each decoration. He takes photos of every single house they pass and photos of entire sides of the street at a time. He comments on each house, detailing to Crowley all the parts he loves. He takes inspiration from some houses, too, listing off different ideas for how to decorate the inside of Crowley’s flat. 

“We could hang ornaments on that light fixture—“

“So glitter can fall in my breakfast? No chance, angel.”

“You don’t eat breakfast.”

“So glitter can fall in  _ your  _ breakfast?”

“I believe that’s  _ my  _ decision to make.” Aziraphale huffs with a pointed look. “And I’ve decided that it’s worth it.”

Crowley sneers and Aziraphale pays it absolutely no mind. 

By the time they make it to the end, successfully having enjoyed half of the houses, Crowley’s hands are freezing, even in his pockets. He’s still adamantly determined to not mention anything about it, but Aziraphale seems to have noticed. How, Crowley will never know, but Aziraphale has always had strangely perceptive abilities, especially when it comes to Crowley. And especially now that they’ve been spending so much time together. Aziraphale reads Crowley’s heart like an open book and it’s just a ticking time bomb until Aziraphale finds the newest truth of his heart and this entire thing they’ve built implodes because Crowley got seriously invested in something that was never meant to be serious at all. 

“Dear,” Aziraphale pauses at the end of the sidewalk, just before the driveway they’ll use to get back into the street without having to weave through any decorations. “Did you forget your gloves?”

“Forget?” Crowley echoes and he sees the ghost of the smile on Aziraphale’s lips that means he’s being courteous and making a purposeful decision to not tease Crowley for being ill prepared, even though Crowley had teased him for being overly prepared. His traitorous heart aches in his chest. “Yeah, er, something like that.”

“Well then.” Aziraphale tugs the glove off of his right hand and extends it to Crowley. For a moment, they just stand there and stare at each other. Or rather, Aziraphale stares at Crowley while Crowley stares blankly at the glove between them. “This is for you, darling. You’re meant to take it. Maybe even put it on your hand if you’re feeling particularly cheeky.”

“Cheeky?” The word alone snaps Crowley out of his shock and he glances up to find Aziraphale’s smile had slid just a little closer to teasing. “What am I meant to do with one glove? I do have two hands in cases you didn’t know, angel.”

“I also have two hands.” Aziraphale answers, holding up both of his own to demonstrate his point. “So you’re going to have to try harder if you’re trying to one-up me.”

“I’m not trying to do anything.” Crowley looks back at the glove before clarifying. “Other than understand.”

Aziraphale laughs and his breath fans out in front of him in a white puff. “You take the glove and you put it on your hand. That way, your hand is warm.”

“ _ One _ hand is warm.”

“Yes,  _ one _ .”

“But there’s  _ two _ .”

“If you’d let me get that far—”

“How was I supposed to know there was more?”

“Crowley.” Aziraphale huffs and Crowley pauses, looking obediently up at Aziraphale. “You take the glove and you put it on your hand.” 

When Crowley makes no immediate move to do that or anything else, Aziraphale reaches out for his right hand, catching by the wrist and pulling him closer. Crowley allows his hand to be moved, entirely uncertain where this is going. Gently, so gently, with so much care and consideration, Aziraphale slips the glove on over Crowley’s hands, delicately threading his fingers into the right place. The glove is warm against the sensitive skin of his palm and Aziraphale’s hand is even warmer, a flame licking at the pulse in Crowley’s wrist. 

“Angel—“

“And your other hand,” Aziraphale nearly whispers, so painfully intimate that Crowley has no hope of surviving. “Comes to me so that I may keep it warm.”

Aziraphale releases Crowley’s now gloved hand and reaches for his free hand, his fingers sliding gently across Crowley’s palm before taking hold of his hand completely. Their fingers interlock like a knot, a promise to never be broken, holding them together, binding them so that they may never separate. 

Well, Crowley is more than just  _ warm _ now, he’s  _ on fire _ . The hand that Aziraphale is currently holding— it takes all of his strength to not stare blankly at their intertwined fingers like he’d done at the glove— is perfectly content in its new location. Aziraphale, with a smile as brilliant as the lights surrounding them, presses a gentle kiss to the back of Crowley’s hand.

“That’s—” Crowley starts to say but the rest of the sentence fails him and every word he seems to have ever known flees from his mind immediately.

“Come on, darling, we still have half the lights to see.” Aziraphale smiles warmly at him and gives a gentle tug on their conjoined hands as he heads down the driveway. Crowley follows along, his fingers wrapped tightly around Aziraphale’s.

They do the other half of the street just as slowly as they did the first but this time, Crowley doesn’t feel the need to rush them along. His cheeks are no doubt as pink as Aziraphale’s, but he’s warm now and able to tolerate staying out for as long as Aziraphale wants. The neighborhood really is beautiful and the snow sets the perfect scene. Even Crowley has to admit that he sees the appeal in this. There’s something magical in the air, sort of like the warmth that’s surrounding him now, that makes it a special moment. He feels lighter, happier, like he’s in the exact spot he’s meant to be in at this very moment. 

His nerves settle into this new position, comforted by the way Aziraphale is continuing to reach out for him as if nothing has changed. And maybe nothing needs to change, maybe Crowley has been overthinking everything. Maybe it’s all just fine and Crowley can keep this precious thing they’ve built nestled tenderly in his heart, maybe he can nurse it into something even more beautiful than it is now. He’s not sure, but the way Aziraphale pulls him close makes him think Aziraphale might not object. 

They stop in front of the final house and Crowley thinks that it’s probably over and they’re going to head back to the car. Aziraphale seems to think differently. 

“Come here, darling, it’s time for our photo,” Aziraphale murmurs, tugging Crowley right to his side. Crowley goes willingly, finding himself pressed against Aziraphale in no time and not making any immediate attempt to put space between the two of them. “If I could just— ah! Excuse me, would you mind taking a photo of us?”

The stranger Aziraphale had stopped gladly accepted the phone being offered to them, gesturing for Crowley and Aziraphale to get into place. They back up together, hands still locked together, and find the perfect space between two of the well-lit trees to stand so that the entire house can be in the photo. The stranger holds up the phone and takes a moment to center themselves so that they can get everything in the photo. 

“I’ll take a couple!” They yell, and then they start counting down.

Crowley steps another foot closer to Aziraphale, practically leaning into his side as they smile for the camera. He can’t hear the shutter on the phone click, but the stranger changes positions and flips the phone to different angles as they snap away, so he assumes that photos  _ are _ being taken. Aziraphale laughs quietly to himself and it draws Crowley’s attention.

“What?” He murmurs, trying his best not to disrupt his smile.

“It’s just—” Aziraphale looks up at him and their eyes lock and for a moment, Crowley considers leaning down and kissing him right here and now. “I’m glad you seem to be enjoying yourself. That’s all.”

Crowley considers being snide in response, or denying the obvious, but he decides against it. “Yeah, I am.” He says and then pauses for a moment before adding, “And I’m glad I got to share it with you.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale says quietly and Crowley watches as his eyes soften. 

Aziraphale leans the tiniest bit closer and Crowley thinks that they really are going to kiss, right here and now, in the front yard of a house that doesn’t belong to either of them while a stranger snaps photos on Aziraphale’s phone. 

“Perfect!” The stranger cries suddenly and both Crowley and Aziraphale snap back to the moment and lean away from each other. 

Aziraphale clears his throat as he takes the phone back with a smile, his bare hand still wrapped around Crowley’s. They thank the man before he disappears and step out of the yard they’re standing in. They finish the walk back to the Bentley in silence, Crowley’s heart thundering in his chest the entire time. Were they really about to kiss? He supposes it’s not unreasonable given that they’ve— well. But the goal is to stop their lie from becoming even more public and that— that would not have been the way to achieve it.

If Aziraphale glances at Crowley out of the corner of his eye a few times, the edge of his lip bitten to avoid a smile, well Crowley can’t deal with acknowledging that right now because he’s trying to function long enough to get them home and that was hard enough with just the feeling of Aziraphale’s palm against his and now he has an almost kiss to consider. It’s a miracle his legs are still working and haven’t instead just turned into jelly underneath him.

Which is stupid, really. Because he’s kissed Aziraphale before. Plenty of times. And in front of many other people. It’s not like this would be some new thing— it was practically old hat at this point. But it  _ felt _ new. It felt raw and real and charged with so much emotion. Some part of the back of Crowley’s mind insists that this isn’t new either, that every single kiss thus far has meant more than the last. It insists that each kiss, each touch, every single lingering look has been steadily gaining more and more meaning, more weight and purpose behind each one. Every time they kiss, a bigger swarm of butterflies erupts in his stomach. 

He’s not getting used to kissing Aziraphale, to holding him close in the middle of the night. But he is getting more and more addicted to it. 

The Bentley comes into view and they finally separate long enough to climb back in. Crowley slots the key into the ignition and turns her on but doesn’t immediately shift into drive, his mind swirling around something like five topics at once. Aziraphale already has his phone out and is sifting through the pictures, so Crowley leans over his shoulder to see them too.

The first few photos are nice enough and they’ll look great in the article when it’s posted in the morning, but Crowley doesn’t really care for them all that much. Their smiles are large and genuine but a little too posed if he looks at them closely. But the last photo— the last photo Crowley hadn’t realized the man was taking. It’s a photo of him and Aziraphale looking at each other, Aziraphale’s chin tilted up just the tiniest bit to be able to meet Crowley’s gaze head on. Their smiles have shrunk into something much more intimate and tender and Crowley almost feels like he’s looking in on a private moment, even though it’s a moment he had lived just a few minutes before. 

Aziraphale traces a finger gently over the screen as he looks at the photo and Crowley feels like his face is completely aflame. Without thinking, he ducks his head, pressing his forehead against Aziraphale’s shoulder. Aziraphale gently removes his hand from the screen, reaching across his body to place it gently on top of Crowley’s head, instead.

“I’ll send these to you.” Aziraphale murmurs and the smile is audible in his voice. “Not that I think you want them— I’m sure you don’t.” He hastens to add, even though the lie is absolutely obvious. “It’s just so you can put them in the article.”

“For the article.” Crowley mumbles into Aziraphale’s jacket. “Just the article. Nothing else.”

Nothing else, he tells himself. Definitely not something like the background of his phone.

“Of course.” Aziraphale replies fondly. “Now if you’ll be a dear and drive us home, I think I’d like a second cup of hot cocoa.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “There.” Aziraphale brushes his hands off and another puff of glitter trails to the ground. Crowley is going to be vacuuming for weeks and still collecting the stuff. “It looks lovely.”
> 
> And Crowley has to admit that it _does_. His flat feels smaller, but in a homey way. It’s hard to describe the difference but it feels warmer, too, like good things happen here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so today has been a very bad day in my life and then writing this chapter was so soft and full of such fun banter that it made me feel a little better. THIS is the chapter length that most of the future chapters will be. This was manageable to write after an 11 hour work day. So please only expect this length or even a little shorter!
> 
> To those of you not in cold climates for winter, sorry to invalidate your christmas last chapter xD I come from a place where it doesn't feel like christmas without snow so that's what I'm writing from but your warm christmases are still super valid!!!!
> 
> I hope you guys are in for some stupid bickering because that's mostly all this chapter is. And I really enjoyed writing it.

Crowley wakes up slowly the next morning, warm and comfortable with a hand in his hair. It takes him a moment to fight off the edges of sleep, blinking bleary eyes open against the light in the room. He’s on his side, arm wedged up under his pillow and blankets low around his waist, torso exposed. He spares a moment to think that’s odd— he’s always rather cold and usually sleeps with at least two blankets in the winter in a desperate attempt to keep some body heat in. The only reason he hasn’t been sleeping with two blankets lately is—

He recognizes the hand in his hair.

“Mornin’, angel.” He mumbles, reaching up to scrub his free hand across his face.

Aziraphale’s hand retreats from his hair almost instantly, as if he’d been caught. “Oh, I didn’t expect you to be awake this early.”

“Why’d you go?” Crowley’s eyes have already slid shut again and he scoots a little closer to Aziraphale, chasing his warmth and the feeling of his fingers on Crowley’s scalp. “Was nice.”

There’s a quiet laugh, overflowing with fondness, and then the fingers are back in his hair, brushing it away from his face and over his shoulder with such a delicate touch that Crowley could fall right back asleep. 

“You are quite something,” Aziraphale murmurs as if he thinks that Crowley has fallen asleep already. He murmurs it like he thinks that Crowley won’t hear it— a promise whispered into the early morning air, a secret bared with only a few souls around to see it. “Incredibly lovely in the morning.”

Crowley makes some sound that’s half hum, half protest and reaches up to halfheartedly swat at Aziraphale’s hand. It doesn’t nothing to make Aziraphale stop and instead lands him with a warm hand cupping his face, thumb stroking his cheek. Crowley blinks again, forcing his eyes to stay open this time and looks up to see Aziraphale half propped up in bed, a book open in his lap.

Ever since they’d really started living this lie, things had become incredibly real. Aziraphale had stacks of books scattered around Crowley’s house, and some of his clothes tucked neatly into the drawers of his dresser. It wasn’t  _ that _ much— it wasn’t like they had moved in together by any means, but there was enough of Aziraphale’s presence there to make it obvious that they were getting close, that they were wrapping themselves up in each other and tangling so tightly together that they’d never be unwound.

“What’s today?” Crowley asks as he adjusts himself, pulling his nearly numb arm out from underneath his pillow. “What stupid list thing?”

“It’s day  _ two _ ,” Aziraphale admonishes gently, pulling his hand away from Crowley’s face. “You can’t have possibly forgotten already.”

“I am  _ very _ talented” Crowley replies, propping an elbow underneath him and yawning, stretching his other arm overhead. Aziraphale watches him for a lingering moment, his cheeks tinting pink before he hastily glances away, fiddling with the book in his lap. 

“We are decorating today, darling.” Aziraphale answers after a momentary pause, one that felt filled with something particular, certain familiar tingling that grew quickly to electricity between them if they let it.

“Right.” Crowley sits all the way up in bed and tousles his hair with his fingers. “I must’ve forcibly pushed it out of my mind.”

“Oh stop being so difficult.” Aziraphale rolls his eyes and clasps both of his hands around the book in his lap. “It’s going to be lovely. There’s going to be so much more life in your flat!”

They had originally agreed to do everything in Crowley’s flat because it was closer and less cluttered. Aziraphale had called it a “blank slate” and rattled off a series of ideas of just how they should decorate it. Crowley hadn’t really cared either way when they’d first talked about it but now, curled up in bed with Aziraphale, the soft air of sleep still floating gently in the air around them, he found that he was rather glad that it was at his flat.

It would be something to remember, years in the future. He’d forever be able to stand in his doorway and imagine Aziraphale there, under the covers of his bed, reading by the night of the lamp on the bedside table, his glasses perched on his nose. He’d be able to remember the smell of fresh waffles in the morning and the way Aziraphale hummed to himself as he made them. He would remember everything about this Christmas for the rest of his life— he already had a spot for it marked in his heart. It was labeled ‘best Christmas ever’.

Because the truth was that Aziraphale was right— his flat had been empty and void of any special touches before. But that wasn’t true now. Now it had the essence of Aziraphale in every corner, the life he breathed into it. It had the memory of gentle touches and warm kisses, the softness of evening spent murmuring to each other, half drunk and half asleep as they watched yet another movie that didn’t live up to Aziraphale’s standards. It was no longer just a place to house his stuff— it was becoming a home.

And decorating it for Christmas together was surely going to be the thing that pushed it over the edge. He was almost, dare he say it, excited about it.

“I happen to think my flat is quite stylish.” Crowley replies instead of voicing any of his other thoughts aloud. He and Aziraphale seem to have an understanding and an agreement— albeit utterly unspoken but certainly implied— that they were going to live this lie to the fullest, to really embody it and bring it to life so that there were no gaps in it, no oversights that could get them caught.

Crowley wasn’t about to fuck it up by having a real conversation that poked about a million holes in their lie and turned it into something even more realistic and heartwrenchingly genuine than it was before. 

He could do this, he could live with things the way they are until Christmas, until they have their conversation and figure out their plan. He can wake up to Aziraphale in his bed, fingers in his hair, the soft crinkle at the corner of blue eyes that he loved looking into. He could very happily live with that. And he was going to— he was going to take what was given to him and he was going to hold on with both hands, clinging to it until it chose to left him behind.

“Your flat—” Aziraphale starts to say, but whatever the end of his sentence might have been is cut off by Crowley leaning in to swiftly plant a kiss on his lips.

Crowley braces on hand on Aziraphale’s thigh for support and immediately Aziraphale’s hand reached up and curls into the hair at the nape of his neck, pulling him closer to kiss him more soundly.

* * *

Aziraphale hadn’t been kidding when he had said Crowley doesn’t eat breakfast. He doesn’t. He drags himself out of bed and practically slithers to the kitchen counter where he’s barely in a position that could be considered upright until he finishes at least one glass of coffee. His shoulder length hair falls in gentle waves around his face and he tosses them back carelessly, seemingly unaware of the way it makes Aziraphale’s heart stutter in his chest.

They had stopped on the way back last night to pick up the entirety of Aziraphale’s Christmas decorations and Crowley had complained exactly as much as Aziraphale had expected him to as they’d carried them in and stacked the boxes in the living room so they could sort through them today.

In truth, Aziraphale was elated for them to be doing this together. He loved decorating for Christmas but it wasn’t something he ever dedicated much time to. He would putter away at it in small bits over the length of a week, taking breaks from whatever analysis he was working on at the time to stretch his legs and hang a few ornaments. It felt like he barely got to have the tree up three days between when he was done decorating it finally and when it was time to take it down.

But this year— this year it was going to be up for at least two  _ weeks _ . And he was going to get to dedicate as much time as he wanted to it. He had somehow landed himself in a situation where his literal and actual job for the day was to put up decorations with his husband. He was being  _ paid _ to drag Crowley through this and he was about ready to jump out of his skin with excitement.

Crowley was halfway through his second glass of coffee, starting to seem vaguely human again and Aziraphale figured it was time to start. He’d eaten his breakfast in the time it had taken Crowley to finally get out of bed, the dishes already sorted in the dishwasher. 

“Ready, darling?” Aziraphale asks cheerily, a hand landing on the small of Crowley’s back where he’s sitting at the counter. 

In truth, Aziraphale knows this still has to end. He knows that he can’t hold onto this life they’ve created forever. No matter how much he’s enjoying it— no matter how many times he gets the sheer joy of waking up to Crowley  _ right there _ , to having Crowley kiss him languidly as they started their morning slowly— the truth was that it was a farce. It wasn’t a real marriage, wasn’t a real life. And sure, it  _ felt _ real, unbearable real, so real it actually created an ache in Aziraphale’s chest at the thought of losing it.

But it was still a  _ lie _ .

They couldn’t just spend the rest of their lives playing house and telling everyone around them that they were something more. 

But what they  _ could _ do, what Aziraphale  _ planned _ on doing was living these next two weeks to their fullest. They had been handed an excuse, a perfect chance to change absolutely nothing about what they’d been doing and Aziraphale wanted desperately to take advantage of it.

(The part of him that read too many romance novels for work was screaming at him, desperately yelling the same word at him over and over again, begging him to say it but he wouldn’t do it. There was no point in it, not when this would be ending just after the holidays.)

“Not sure it’s possible to be ready.” Crowley mumbles, his early morning voice softening into something a little less rugged. He peers up at Aziraphale from over the top of his coffee mug, his golden eyes molten in the light that slants in through the windows. 

Aziraphale feels his breath being taken away.

He glances away quickly because he wanted to take advantage of these two weeks, yes, but he didn’t want to lay his heart on the line or to say anything that might burden Crowley, that might jeopardize Crowley’s ability to just walk away from this when it’s all over. Whatever ache Aziraphale feels deep in his chest at the thought of this ending is his burden and his alone, so he must tread carefully to make sure that he keeps the weight of those feelings off of Crowley’s shoulders. 

“Come along, then.” Aziraphale replies, his cheerful mood completely unbothered by Crowley.

With a huff and a sigh, Crowley draws himself up and out of his seat, slinking after Aziraphale into the living room. Aziraphale reaches for his phone, turning on some Christmas music and sending Crowley a sharp look to cut off any comments that may arise about Aziraphale’s ability to use his phone for such complicated ventures. A smirk settles onto Crowley’s lips anyways out of the sheer knowledge that Aziraphale knew what he was going for without him having to say a word. It shouldn’t count as a win for him but even Aziraphale knows that it does.

Crowley tries to take a seat on the couch but Aziraphale catches him by the elbow before he can and together they get started.

It takes awhile to sort out what is in each box— Aziraphale really should label them when he puts everything away this year to save his future self some trouble— and in what feels like the blink of an eye they’re already starting to assemble the Christmas tree, false pine needles scattering everywhere.

“How is it making such a bloody mess?” Crowley murmurs, shaking out a few strands of his hair in a futile attempt to get rid of the needles that have nestled their way in. It doesn’t do much good. “It’s not even a real tree!”

Aziraphale can’t suppress a smile as he reaches out to help, delicately extracting the needles from the silky strands of Crowley’s hair.

“It’s just trying to make you more festive.”

“Don’t want to be bloody festive.” Crowley mumbles, his cheeks darkening to a red flush that looks absolutely stunning with his hair. “Want to be back in bed.”

“Is it hard to be as dramatic as you are?” Aziraphale asks with a roll of his eyes, turning back to the tree.

Crowley follows suit. “Not anymore.” He crooks a smile at Aziraphale who feels his heart flutter in his chest. “I’ve had plenty of practice.”

“I’ll say you have.”

Crowley reaches into the bin in front of him, selecting a piece of tinsel and throwing it at Aziraphale. 

“Honestly.” Aziraphale chides as he catches the tinsel before it can reach him. “How old are you?”

“Focus on the task at hand, would you, angel?” Crowley grins over his shoulder as he raises up on top toes to put one of the final branches on the tree. “I’m over here hard at work putting up all these decorations while you slack off.”

“You are a wicked man.” Aziraphale remarks as he puts the tinsel back in the container with the rest of it and moves to pull out the lights. 

“You know,” Crowley drops back onto flat feet and comes to stand next to Aziraphale to admire their handiwork. “The last time you said that to me, you married me.”

Aziraphale feels his own cheeks flush red and there’s a particularly dastardly look in Crowley’s eye that reminds Aziraphale of the man he had known before all of this— the one who sought to push his buttons at every given opportunity. Only this time he doesn’t feel horribly annoyed. His day isn’t ruined, but rather made. 

“That’s very bold of you to say.” Aziraphale begins unwinding the strand of lights in his hand, purposefully not looking at Crowley as he adds, “considering I thought you might die just holding my hand last night.” 

Crowley makes a choked noise and splutters out a bunch of half sentences. “I don’t— that was—“

“It’s okay, darling.” Aziraphale says as he finally looks up at Crowley, leaning in to press a kiss to his cheek. “It was quite charming.”

Crowley groans and makes a show of wiping Aziraphale’s kiss off of his cheek, grabbing the lights and nearly stomping across the room to plug them in. “And you said  _ I  _ was the wicked one.” 

Aziraphale laughs and starts unraveling the next set of lights. 

* * *

It takes damn near the whole day and what feels like four hundred pounds of glitter, but Crowley’s flat is fully decorated. The tree is up— with no small amount of swearing over the sheer number of lights that had the audacity not to work— and covered in ornaments. There’s a garland that hangs in the doorway, also covered in ornaments, and a series of holiday themed knick knacks on various surfaces throughout the house. Aziraphale had even gone so far as to hang a wreath on Crowley’s door.

Aziraphale had tried to hang ornaments on the light fixture in the kitchen but Crowley had adamantly refused, removing each ornament immediately after Aziraphale had put it on. 

“There.” Aziraphale brushes his hands off and another puff of glitter trails to the ground. Crowley is going to be vacuuming for  _ weeks _ and still collecting the stuff. “It looks lovely.”

And Crowley has to admit that it  _ does _ . His flat feels smaller, but in a homey way. It’s hard to describe the difference but it feels warmer, too, like good things happen here. It feels like a home and he had genuinely enjoyed his time with Aziraphale setting it up. They’d laughed and bickered, passing different decorations back and forth. 

Crowley had hammered a nail into his wall at least six times before he’d finally gotten the right spot and honestly he was about two seconds away from giving up in sheer frustration. They had set things up only to move them somewhere else. And then move them again. And then put them back where they’d started out at after all. 

And they had gotten absolutely covered in glitter. 

Crowley knows it’s in his hair. It’s in his bloody  _ eyelashes _ — he can see it catch the light sometimes. It feels like it’s completely glued to his hands because it won’t leave, no matter how many times he wipes his hands on his (not so) black pants. Aziraphale is covered in glitter too, but he manages to make it look stunning. It dusts his cheeks, catching the light as he turns to look at Crowley expectantly. 

“Alright.” Crowley concedes after a moment, “it’s not  _ terrible _ .”

“Oh, do write that in our article, would you?” Aziraphale rolls his eyes before pitching his voice lower in what is clearly meant to be a mockery of Crowley. “ _ And for today’s task, we put up our not terrible Christmas decorations! _ ”

“I do not sound like that.” Crowley huffs immediately. “That sentence is far too awkward. I have much more panache than that.”

“Oh, dear me, you’re quite right. Let me try again.  _ Today we put up our Christmas decorations. It was not the worst thing I’ve ever done which is surprising considering that I hate Christmas and have no festive spirit— _ “

“I never said I hate Christmas!” 

“No, what was it you actually said?  _ I don’t do holiday spirit _ ?” 

“That’s about enough of your awful impersonations, angel.” 

Aziraphale grins at him in response and reaches out for him, dragging Crowley to his side. “Oh, I thought I was doing a rather good impression.”

“I assure you,” Crowley mumbles, one of his hands gently wrapping around Aziraphale’s wrist in the small space between them. “You weren’t. Now stop being such an arse so we can take a picture.”

“Heavens above!” Aziraphale gasped quietly, a hand dramatically clutching his chest. “Did  _ you  _ just suggest we take a photo? Are you feeling quite alright?” 

Crowley rolls his eyes but he can feel the way the corners of his mouth want to lift up into a smile. He bites it back, shoves it down, does everything he can to stop himself from giving in.

“I’m happy to make the picture for this article just me and this tree that I worked  _ very hard  _ on if you continue to be such a bastard.” Crowley warns but it’s an absolutely hollow threat and they both know it. 

Suddenly Aziraphale’s hand slides up in Crowley’s grasp so that they’re properly holding hands. Crowley thinks of Aziraphale’s jab from earlier and forces himself to meet Aziraphale’s gaze, even as its soft and fond and overflowing with the sort of mischief that is only endearing on Aziraphale. 

“Well now, I can’t let them think you did  _ all  _ the work, can I?” Aziraphale laughs quietly and he’s close enough that Crowley can feel the way his shoulders shake with his laughter. 

It takes them a moment to line up, pressed together along one side of the tree, phone angled  _ just so _ to be able to catch a glimpse of the garland in the background. Crowley slides his arm around Aziraphale’s waist, hand gripping his hip firmly as he rips his head to the side to better fit in the photo. Aziraphale leans into his side, warm and firm and comforting.

“Say ‘Merry Christmas!’” Aziraphale cries as he smiles. 

Crowley snaps the photos silently. 

Aziraphale exaggerates a frown as he turns to look at Crowley who is studiously avoiding him as he looks through the photos. They all look great, he could pick any of them for the article that he still has to write, assuming his computer isn’t drowned in a like or glitter somewhere. 

But he can still feel the weight of Aziraphale’s stare so he finally gives in and looks up. “You knew I wasn’t going to say it, angel. I don’t do holiday spirit, remember?”

“I’ll get you to say it.” Aziraphale declares with far more confidence than Crowley likes to see directed at him. 

Especially when he knows that Aziraphale is probably right. 

“Whatever you say.”

“I’ll get you to say it.” Aziraphale repeats and he putters off in the general direction of the broom. 

Especially when he knows that Aziraphale is  _ definitely  _ right. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By the time the cookies— sugar cookies, as it turns out, not that Crowley had any idea until he was told— come out of the oven, they are completely misshapen and absolutely nothing like the shape they had been in before baking. Crowley is nearly doubled over with laughter at just the sight of them— weird blobs that didn’t resemble anything at all.
> 
> “Oh, I am absolutely putting pictures of these on the site.” He cackles, picking up a particularly misshapen cookie and examining it. “What was it even _meant_ to be?”
> 
> Aziraphale snatches the still warm cookie out of his hand and it crumbles apart in his grip. “It was a snowman, I’ll have you know.”
> 
> “Well, it certainly isn’t one anymore.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> asklfjaklsjdf I wrote this chapter in under an hour and didn't start it until like 11:30 at night so please don't judge it too harshly. It's not doubt not up to par of the rest of the chapters but it's still something, so there's that! we will forge on from here and hopefully come back stronger with the next chapter. Until then, please enjoy a conversation that needs to happen and very little of the task they're actually meant to be doing, rip.

Given that the snow hadn’t let up much in the last two days, Crowley was perfectly happy to stay indoors. He’d barely made their article deadline last night and had gotten to bed far later than he’d meant to, falling asleep practically the moment his head hit the pillow. As such, he had given Aziraphale free reign to choose whatever it was on that blasted list that he wanted to do today. Aziraphale had taken one look at Crowley, still half asleep in his joggers with his hair knotted messily at the base of his neck and had selected something that required almost nothing from Crowley. 

And so, Crowley finds himself with his head propped into his hand, laptop open in front of him as Aziraphale rolls out some sort of dough on the counter. Crowley is currently occupying his time by scrolling through the comments on their latest article— something Beelzebub had insisted upon. And it wasn’t just  _ reading  _ the comments that they were meant to be doing, but  _ responding _ to some of them, too.

What a load of shite, honestly. Crowley couldn’t give a fuck less about what people said in response to their pictures of his now decorated flat— and people, as it turned out, had  _ opinions _ .

“This person says you didn’t put enough ornaments on the tree, angel.” Crowley points at the screen as if there’s something there that would help identify the person in question. 

Aziraphale scoffs, hands gripping the rolling pin with too much strength. “It would look  _ gaudy _ —“

“They say that it’s not enough if you can still see green.” Crowley raises his shoulders in a shrug, watching as the comment lands on Aziraphale’s shoulders.

“Well they’re  _ wrong.” _

_ “ _ I'll be sure to reply and tell them that.” Crowley sits upright and places his hands over the keys, clicking nonsensically, not at all set up to actually be replying to a comment. 

Aziraphale’s head snaps up. “Better not. You’d get us fired in an instant.”

“I don’t know about an  _ instant _ .” Crowley grins, pulling his hands away. “I think Beelzebub would have a bit to say about it first. Surely at least a ten minute lecture.”

Aziraphale laughs, seemingly despite himself and turns back to the dough before him. Crowley tries not to watch the way he kneads it, bringing it together just to roll it out again. He’d been doing this all morning, mixing ingredients together in a mixing bowl that Crowley hadn’t honestly even known he’d had. He also didn’t have any idea how the ingredients for the cookies had gotten into his flat because he certainly hadn’t bought them. Chalk it up to mystery— or more likely the idea that Aziraphale had gone out and bought them before he’d woken up this morning.

Aziraphale had spent a large part of the night before nagging him to get into bed because he was clearly exhausted but he had refused, adamant that he could get the article done and then sleep in. Getting up early to get the ingredients before he woke up was the exact kind of courteous thing that Aziraphale would do.

“Yes, well, that would rather save us, don’t you think?” Aziraphale hums as he pauses what he’s doing.

He pulls back from the counter a moment, brushing his hands off on a dish towel that’s hanging from the oven door. Once his hands are sufficiently cleaned, he pushes up the sleeves of his jumper before carefully unbuttoning the cuff of his shirt and gently rolling the sleeve up in perfect folds. Crowley watches, transfixed, as Aziraphale’s forearms are slowly bared to him. He watches the flex of his muscles under the skin as his fingers work delicately but with a certain amount of steadiness and determination. 

Crowley feels his throat go dry as he continues to watch, the skin of Aziraphale’s forearms far tanner than he thought they’d be. He had mostly just assumed that they hadn’t seen the light of day in forty-something years and would have expected them to be very pale. They’re also distinctly more muscular than Crowley had imagined in his mind— not that he’d ever imagined something as specific as Aziraphale’s forearms, of course. It takes every ounce of mental control and then some for Crowley to not to watch them as Aziraphale picks the rolling pin back up and resumes what he’d been doing.

It’s another few seconds before Crowley realizes that Aziraphale had said something and that he was meant to respond somehow. The problem was, he honestly couldn’t imagine what it was that Aziraphale had said.

“Er— what?”

Aziraphale’s gaze is very focused on what he’s doing, although he isn’t doing much. He’s staring with a strong determination at the cookie dough that is spread out below him, even though his hands have stopped working entirely. “It would save us.” Aziraphale repeats slowly, like the words hurt, like he doesn’t want to say them. “If Beelzebub just fired us, I mean. Save us from figuring out what we’re going to do.”

Right.

Of course.

The looming rain cloud that Crowley had been trying his hardest to avoid. He knew it would come to a head eventually, knew the day would come where the cloud would open up and he’d find himself entirely soaked and shivering down to the bone. He just— he hadn’t thought it would be so soon.

He forces a hollow laugh and Aziraphale nearly winces at the sound of it. “Yeah, we still need to do that, don’t we? Figure it out. Got a bit— lost in the shuffle of the last few days.”

“We—”

“I mean, I haven’t really  _ thought  _ about it,” Crowley rambles on, his nerves suddenly tingling under his skin, making him feel jittery. “But we’re both writers, we can come up with something, yeah?”

‘Crowley—”

“Give ‘em a big show, all that.”

“ _ Crowley. _ ” It finally makes its way through the haze of Crowley’s nervous fumbling with his words, snaps through the beating of his heart so loud he can hear it in his ears. He doesn’t look up to meet Aziraphale’s gaze because he doesn’t think he can bear that, but he does promptly snap his mouth shut and listen obediently. “It  _ is _ something we need to discuss but, well, I was rather hoping we could talk about it… after the holidays?”

Crowley stills in his chair and he isn’t sure if he feels relieved or not. “After the holidays?”

“It’s just, we have this assignment, you know? And I think we should—” Aziraphale takes a deep breath and it seems to shudder out of him all at once. “I think we should continue to really embody it and just enjoy the holiday. It’s  _ Christmas _ , after all. We can address it later.”

It’s not  _ great _ news, ultimately— just another delay of the inevitable. But Crowley feels the tension drain from his shoulders as his heart beats a little more freely in his chest. It was a problem for future him. Current him got to live in domestic bliss for the next week and a half with Azirpahale’s full permission to embrace things to their fullest. And if it was the last week and a half he had, he was absolutely going to go out of his way to get the most out of this time.

“After the holidays sounds great, angel.” Crowley remarks, “Never sounds even better.”

Aziraphale sends him a dirty look and flings some flour in his direction.

* * *

By the time the cookies— sugar cookies, as it turns out, not that Crowley had any idea until he was told— come out of the oven, they are completely misshapen and absolutely nothing like the shape they had been in before baking. Crowley is nearly doubled over with laughter at just the sight of them— weird blobs that didn’t resemble anything at all.

“Oh, I am absolutely putting pictures of these on the site.” He cackles, picking up a particularly misshapen cookie and examining it. “What was it even  _ meant _ to be?”

Aziraphale snatches the still warm cookie out of his hand and it crumbles apart in his grip. “It was a  _ snowman _ , I’ll have you know.”

“Well, it certainly isn’t one anymore.”

“It just needs a little frosting, that’s all.” Aziraphale drops the crumbled pieces of the cookie onto the counter where the rest of the generic blobs are sitting, waiting for something to salvage them.

Crowley is absolutely certain that there is nothing they can do to turn these into snowmen, but he’s not going to tell Aziraphale that. He takes the piping bag that’s handed to him, filled with homemade white icing, and he sets about his work. He’s anything but a practiced hand and piping icing is much harder than he could’ve ever anticipated that it would be. Aziraphale seems much more at ease with it but even his icing isn’t turning his cookies into snowmen.

Crowley bites the edge of his lip to keep from smiling as he works, trying to hold back any snide remarks that are coming to mind. Truthfully he knows— and fuck, that’s something he’s going to have to unpack in a moment here— that it’s not about the finished product but about the fun they have along the way.

And he is having fun, listening to Aziraphale mumble every word he can think of that  _ isn’t _ a curse word under his breath, watching as he turns his cookie this way and then that way, as if it will resemble what it’s meant to if it’s just viewed from the right  _ angle _ . 

Crowley feels a warm fondness prickle in the back of his throat, on the tips of his fingers, along the length of his spine. By now he’s put his own bag of icing down entirely and has foregone even the pretense of working, instead just watching as Aziraphale struggles with one cookie after another. He feels fucking  _ happy _ in this moment, standing in his kitchen doing something that is so far out of his comfort zone it’s unrealistic. He feels happy just watching Aziraphale, just being in the same room as him. He’s just— he’s happy.

And yeah, he still knows it has to end. They haven’t ever said anything to indicate otherwise, but the fact that Aziraphale was willing to push off their conversation, the fact that Aziraphale wants for them to spend their holidays together, enjoying them as happy husbands, well, it gives Crowley hope. And yeah, he knows he can’t count on hope, knows it’s a flame that’s more likely to burn him than it is to lead him out of the darkness. He knows that hope is more his enemy than it is his friend and he just— he doesn’t care. Not right now, not while he’s watching Aziraphale licking rogue icing off the tip of his fingers.

“This blasted thing just won’t work.” Aziraphale grumbles and Crowley is almost knocked off of his feet with an overwhelming flow of— of— he still can’t say it.

He knows the name for it, can taste the bittersweetness of it on his tongue, but he still won’t say that word, not even to himself. 

“I think it looks alright.” Crowley remarks, tilting his head to one side. “It can just be a sort of lopsided stack of snowballs.”

“Snowballs aren’t festive!”

“Sure they are.” Crowley glances up to see Aziraphale’s exasperated expression and he feels his heart bursting in his chest. “It doesn’t snow in the summer, does it?”

Aziraphale huffs but doesn’t protest his point. “I was hoping to bring them when we stopped into the office tomorrow.”

“And you still can.” Crowley picks one of the cookies up, lifting it to his mouth and taking a bite. He's not one for sweets in general— and sugar cookies are very sweet, even without the frosting— but he has a point to make. “All that matters is how they taste.”

The cookie is surprisingly good, even though it’s not Crowley’s typical taste. There’s a little hint of something in there that he can’t quite place his finger on that dulls the sweetness down to a bearable level. He indicates this to Aziraphale, who knows how he feels about things of this nature, by taking another pointed bite, and then another after that. Hardly a moment passes and the entire cookie is gone.

“Well,” Aziraphale looks impressed. “That’s an endorsement if there ever were one.”

“Exactly.” Crowley picks his piping bag back up. “Now finish decorating your lopsided snowballs.”

“They’re not—” Aziraphale goes to protest but he glances down at his plate of cookies and signs in resignation instead. “Fine.”

And Crowley nearly drowns in the comfort of the next hour.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s a Christmas sweater, darling.” Aziraphale extracts the sweater from Crowley’s vice-like grip, and unfolds it, smoothing his hands over the fabric. “It’s not meant to be fashionable.”
> 
> “Well _I_ am meant to be fashionable,” Crowley retorts quickly, shying away from the sweater when Aziraphale extends it to him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, a couple of things!
> 
> 1\. This chapter was not meant to be NSFW but definitely ended up there anyways. It's marked as usual but just know going in that we're earning that E rating here.  
> 2\. I am going to try very, very hard to get both chapters that I owe you guys tomorrow posted but I just want to caution you now that I might not be able to pull it off. We'll see.  
> 3\. I know I am very behind on replying to comments, It's the curse of updating daily. I promise to do my best to get caught up this weekend on those, too. But please know that I read them and that they have helped me a lot this week. I'm so glad to bring Christmas magic to everyone. It's my favorite time of year and I'm really loving sharing it with all of you <3

If there’s one thing Crowley has  _ always _ been prone to, from the very moment that Aziraphale had met him, it was dramatics.

And he was in no short supply of them today as he paced around the flat, the offending material in his hands. “You expect me to wear this?” He holds the sweater up as if Aziraphale doesn’t know what he’s talking about, as if Aziraphale hadn’t handed it to him just mere minutes earlier. “ _ This _ , angel? Do you think I have no sense of fashion?”

“It’s a Christmas sweater, darling.” Aziraphale extracts the sweater from Crowley’s vice-like grip, and unfolds it, smoothing his hands over the fabric. “It’s not  _ meant _ to be fashionable.”

“Well  _ I _ am meant to be fashionable,” Crowley retorts quickly, shying away from the sweater when Aziraphale extends it to him. 

With a huff, Aziraphale catches Crowley by the wrist, pinning him in place. “My dear, I think you will survive  _ one hour _ wearing this sweater.”

“Might have an allergic reaction to it.”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t know that!”

“If you have an allergic reaction to this very harmless sweater,” Aziraphale forces the sweater into Crowley’s hand, his grip tight on Crowley’s wrist to prevent him from pulling away again. “Then I will make it up to you, however you’d like.”

Crowley makes a series of inarticulate protests, trying his hardest to drop the sweater onto the ground. Aziraphale pins him with a look and finally Crowley relents, taking the sweater and slumping his shoulders in defeat. If he’s going to be this dramatic about just  _ wearing _ the sweater, Aziraphale can’t wait to see how he reacts to finding out that they will be wearing  _ matching _ sweaters. He’d actually gotten them for the ugly Christmas sweater party the office was hosting next week but when they’d gotten the email about a Christmas card photoshoot, Aziraphale had known that they needed to wear them for this, too.

If Crowley was only going to wear it once— and even that was looking a little unlikely— Aziraphale was going to make sure it got memorialized.

“The sooner you hurry up and change, the sooner we can get it over with and come back here so you can change back into your ridiculously tight and not at all cold-resistant clothes.” Aziraphale bargains.

In truth, he had known Crowley was going to react like this. While it wasn’t strictly possible to be allergic to color, Crowley certainly seemed to be allergic to anything that wasn’t black. Very rarely he could incorporate red into his wardrobe but even then it was something small— a tie, the underside of his collar, nothing more than just a pop to brighten up his look.

Which is exactly why Aziraphale was  _ dying _ to see him in the sweater. It was red and green striped, absolutely gharrish. Crowley’s had Santa’s sleigh and the beginning length of the reigns which crossed over onto Aziraphale’s jumper where the reindeer would be starting to take flight off into the night sky. They were absolutely hideous, the kind of material that burred easily and looked fuzzy, even from a distance, and Aziraphale could not wait to wear them.

Crowley looked forlornly down at the material in his hands before sighing, nearly collapsing in on himself. He set the sweater down on the arm of the couch they were currently standing next to and unceremoniously began to undo the buttons of his shirt. Aziraphale’s breath hissed through his teeth as he realized what he was about to witness. His fingers twitched unconsciously at his sides with the desire to touch, the memory of Crowley’s skin still alive in his nerves.

Crowley wasn’t looking at Aziraphale as he undid the buttons, one after the other in such a tantalizingly slow pace— no doubt trying to put off having to wear the jumper— that Aziraphale nearly batted his hands away and undid them himself. He didn’t, but the moment Crowley had finally finished the last button and opened his shirt, starting to slide it off of his shoulders, Aziraphale had found that he no longer had any control over himself.

His hand moved forward immediately and on its own volition, smoothing across the skin of Crowley’s stomach in the ghost of a memory. At least this time Crowley wasn’t soaking wet and dripping. No, this time he was warm and pliable, allowing Aziraphale’s hand to travel to his hip, his thumb to hook under his hip bone as his other hand smoothed up his chest and to the side of his neck. Crowley took in a rattling breath and Aziraphale could feel the way it shook him, the way he trembled, pressed so close to Aziraphale. His eyes were wide but inviting and every line of his body, every plane, was angled for Aziraphale.

**[*skip*]**

“Darling,” Aziraphale murmurs, remembering the last time he’d touched Crowley like this, the last time he’d pushed a shirt off of his shoulders. He’d wanted so badly to kiss Crowley then but he couldn’t. Now, though— now he can. And so he does.

He knows in the back of his mind that things are ending sometime in the immediate future, he knows that this has to come to a screeching halt, that everything he wants will have to be ripped away from him someday. But today is not that day and Crowley had already agreed to live the next week to the fullest as  _ husbands _ , and so for today, Aziraphale would allow himself to reach, to pull, to tug Crowley’s body flush against his as he kissed him thoroughly.

And Crowley comes easily, willingly, his body melting into the curves of Aziraphale’s, allowing himself to be led wherever Aziraphale wants him to go. His mouth opens underneath Aziraphale’s and for a moment, all Aziraphale can think about is the taste of him, the feel of his tongue as they come together. He shoves Crowley’s shirt off of his shoulders far less gently than he had the first time and then smooths his hands down the angles of Crowley back, fingers splaying over his ribs, pressing against his shoulder blades.

Crowley makes a sort of broken noise, somewhere between a moan and a gasp, his own arms winding around Aziraphale and dragging him closer. Aziraphale guides them a few stumbling steps until the arm of the couch hits the back of the knees and Crowley falls onto it, throwing his arms out behind him immediately to catch himself without breaking their kiss. He spreads his legs easily and Aziraphale steps in, now about the same height as Crowley or even a little taller. Aziraphale leans down to kiss Crowley and Crowley leans back on his hands, his torso reclining and his head tilting up to meet Aziraphale halfway.

He knows that they really ought to be going. He’d given Beelzebub a time at which they’d be there since the company had hired a professional photographer for this, but he finds that he couldn’t possibly care less about the photographer or their time schedule as he smooths his hands down Crowley’s abdomen again, a fire lighting inside of him. There isn’t a thing on Earth that could pull him away from Crowley now, not a single thing that could stop his hands from undoing Crowley’s belt, from unzipping his trousers. Every single inch of Aziraphale is burning to the ground and he welcomes it, welcomes the heat of Crowley’s mouth on his jaw, his neck. He welcomes the heat of Crowley’s body as he arches his back up, his chest pressing flush against Aziraphale’s.

And more than anything else, he welcomes the noises Crowley is making, the low groans, the gentle moans as Aziraphale’s fingers graze under the waistband of his trousers. He welcomes the way Crowley is gasping for breath against his neck, clinging closer. His strings of half words and incoherent sentences has never been more damn attractive than it is right now, bitten off and swallowed down, the taste sweet on his tongue.

“Angel,  _ ah _ —” Whatever thought Crowley had been trying to articulate seems to abandon him as Aziraphale bites gently down just below his collarbone. Crowley’s elbows shake as they try to support him.

“As much as I’d love to drag this out,” Aziraphale murmurs against the skin of Crowley’s chest, his lips tickling the sensitive area with each word. Crowley shudders. “I’m afraid we’ve got a deadline. So forgive me, darling, but I’m going to have to make quick work of unraveling you.”

One of Crowley’s hands slips off the arm of the couch and he drops back to his elbows, his head falling back on his shoulders and his hair cascading behind him like gorgeous waves of fire. “What is it you’re always saying about language, angel?”

Aziraphale finishes undoing Crowley’s zipper and palms his cock through his boxers, relishing in the sound that comes out of Crowley’s mouth. “I didn’t say anything inappropriate.”

“Right, no, yeah.” Crowley babbles and Aziraphale feels such an overwhelming rush of fondness for him. “Nothing about that could’ve been taken inappropriately.”

Aziraphale chuckles and catches Crowley’s mouth in another searing kiss as he shimmies Crowley’s too tight trousers down off of his hips. Crowley arches his back, lifting his ass up off the couch to allow Aziraphale the freedom he needs and it brings their crotches together, the friction absolutely delectable as Aziraphale feels the firm press of Crowley’s cock against his own.

He’d felt it, once, and had barely been sated. Sometimes in the late hours of the night, Aziraphale found himself dreaming of Crowley and his cock, what it would taste like, what it would really  _ feel _ like to have it. He occasionally woke up, hard and aching with a gorgeous sleeping Crowley at his side, blissfully unaware of Aziraphale and his sins.

Oh but now—  _ now _ Crowley was nothing short of a willing participant in the sin, the blaze that is Aziraphale’s own desire bringing them both down together.

Finally, Crowley is free of his trousers and Aziraphale makes quick work of his boxers after and within a moment, he has the weight of Crowley’s cock in his hand, the taste of Crowley’s moans on his tongue as he pumps him slowly, just a firm enough grip to be felt but not enough to do anything other than drive Crowley maddeningly insane. And oh, it’s working. Aziraphale can tell in the way Crowley writhes underneath him, in the way he reaches for  _ more _ , grips harder, leans closer.

“Angel, I want—”

“Shh, darling.” Aziraphale presses a kiss to the shell of his ear, a nip to the skin just below it. “Let me.”

Before Crowley can protest— which truthfully might not have been a possibility given his dubious relationship with language at the moment— Aziraphale starts to kiss a trail down his chest, across his abdomen, his hand keeping that painfully slow pace the entire time. Crowley drops his head back again, panting. Aziraphale pauses as his knees hit the floor, taking a moment to just enjoy the sight of Crowley’s bare chest heaving for breath, a few strands of his hair falling across his shoulder and dipping into the curve of his neck. He enjoys the sigh of Crowley’s spread legs, his hard cock in Aziraphale’s hand.

He shouldn’t— oh he shouldn’t want this as badly as he does, an inferno that cannot be stopped, a weight that is dragging him to the very depths of hell for these awful desires. He knows it has to end after the holidays, that this isn’t something that is actually  _ his _ — this gorgeous, aching, devastatingly frustrating man. This man who challenges him, who pushes his buttons just to soothe it at the end. This man who listens, who doesn’t judge, who  _ cares _ . This man that he—

Aziraphale swallows and presses a kiss to the inside of Crowley’s thigh as the realization starts to rise to the front of his mind. This is not the time for that, he admonishes himself, picking up his pace on Crowley’s cock. The broken moans that fall off Crowley’s lips, a gift given so freely, something Aziraphale will treasure for the rest of his life, pull him back to the moment at hand. Gently so as to fulfill his promise of unraveling Crowley at the seams, Aziraphale flattens his tongue against the underside of Crowley’s cock, dragging it up slowly to the tip.

Crowley’s hips buck on their own accord as Aziraphale takes just the tip into his mouth, sucking gently and smoothing his tongue around it. Half blasphemies fill the air as Aziraphale takes Crowley further into his mouth, more and more and more until he can feel Crowley at the back of his throat, his hand covering the small remaining area of Crowley’s cock. He sets a fast pace, nearly brutal, his emotions spurring him on, desperate to make Crowley feel the way he feels inside the depths of his heart.

His cheeks hollow, his hand grips and together they move up and down the length of Crowley’s cock, squeezing and sucking at just the right interval to make Crowley lose all coherency. He tries to tilt his head down to meet Aziraphale’s gaze, his eyes half lidded and full of so much lust that Aziraphale nearly comes in his trousers just with the electricity sizzling between them and nothing more. 

The thought occurs to Aziraphale then and he maintains the searing eye contact with Crowley as he reaches down to undo the zipper of his own trousers, shifting just enough to spring his own hard cock free. Crowley groans at the sight of it, at the sight of Aziraphale wrapping his own hand around his own cock to match the pace he’s set on Crowley’s cock.

“Fuck, angel, you look  _ so good _ .” Crowley moans, pushing all of his weight onto one elbow and reaching out to tangle fingers in Aziraphale’s curls with the other, “With you doing that I’m not gonna last—”

Aziraphale takes it as a challenge, doubling down on his efforts and sucking Crowley off with all of the dedication he can possibly give it. Because this is it, this is all he wants. He wants to be able to do this, to do things  _ like _ this, to do whatever he damn well pleases with Crowley whenever he damn well wants to. He wants to have Crowley, to be able to call him his own so that they can actually live this life they’re pretending to call their own.

Crowley lets out a few broken moans and something that sounds like Aziraphale’s name and it’s all the warning Aziraphale needs to sink to the base of Crowley’s cock and hold steady there while Crowley comes, his own hand pumping still until he’s following Crowley over the edge, tumbling to the bottom and hoping that the crash landing doesn’t hurt too badly.

**[*end skip*]**

* * *

If that’s how Aziraphale intends to get him to wear a Christmas sweater, Crowley will wear a Christmas sweater every day of the bloody year, he doesn’t care.

Somehow they had managed to clean up after their encounter and had dragged their asses to the office like they were supposed to. They were a few minutes late and Crowley gladly took blame for all of it, the weight of Beelzebub’s upset gaze barely even noticeable as Crowley damn near floats to where the photographer has their setup.

Aziraphale trails after him, his own smile small but genuine as he settles in next to Crowley, making sure to line up their sweaters properly. In truth the sweaters are fucking  _ hideous _ and should honestly be burned at the stake somewhere, but Crowley feels himself smiling genuinely at the camera, not even the tiniest bit embarrassed about the ugly outfit. He can’t feel a goddamn thing right now besides Cloud Nine underneath his feet.

The photographer laughs outright at the sight of their sweaters and directs them to move together so as to get the exact right angle. Crowley has no hesitancy this time when he reaches for Aziraphale, pulls him closer, sinks into him like they could possibly melt into one being. He would like that, he thinks, being wrapped up in Aziraphale forever.

A few other members of the staff are milling about and watching as they finish their session with the photographer and slowly hop up. Crowley stands first, extending a hand to Aziraphale and feeling the now familiar  _ zing _ up his arm at their contact. He hauls Aziraphale to his feet, steadying him for a moment, their eyes locking. And yeah, it has to end eventually but they’d agreed to live this week to its fullest and everyone in this room already thinks they’re married anyways, so Crowley leans in to kiss Aziraphale right then and there, in front of the whole staff and despite the sound of a clicking camera just off to the side.

When they separate, there’s a faint hoot and a loud whistle that splits the silence of the room and then everyone is laughing. Aziraphale is a delicious shade of red as they finally separate enough to head to the photographer and be shown their photos. 

The company had hired the photographer to take pictures of everyone on staff so that they could post them on the site to wish a happy holiday to their readers. Each employee was offered the option to have a copy sent to their email in case they wanted to send them to anyone in their personal lives. Crowley had no intent to send his copy to anyone, but it didn’t stop him from checking the box on the computer as the photographer reviewed their photos with them.

“Who’d want a Christmas card from you lot?” Hastur sneers as Crowley and Aziraphale step down from the small stage covered in fake snow that the photographer had set up. 

“Our friends, presumably.” Aziraphale replies primly and Crowley feels such a swell of pride overcome him. It’s hardly the kind of scathing remark that Hastur deserves but it’s far less polite than anything else Aziraphale has ever said to him. Maybe they’ll meet in the middle when it comes to Hastur. 

“What, like you have some of those?” Hastur tries to laugh but it fails.

Crowley just smiles at him, a broad grin that makes Hastur flinch away from him. “I’ll be sure to send it to you.” Crowley says, his grin only growing at Hastur’s look of horror. “So that way you can see my beautiful face first thing in the morning.”

“Can’t imagine anything I’d want less.” Hastur sneers back.

“You must not have a very good imagination, then.” Crowley tosses over his shoulder as he drags Aziraphale back towards the building’s entrance. “Now come on, angel. I believe I was told that I only have to wear this ugly thing for an hour and time’s running thin.”

Aziraphale just shakes his head fondly in response. 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Who is it for?” Aziraphale asks and Crowley feels his heart stutter in his chest.
> 
> “Er, well, it’s for you, actually.” He stumbles over the words, unsure of how Aziraphale is going to react to the admission.
> 
> “Me?”
> 
> “Yeah.” Crowley scrubs a hand along the back of his neck, brushing a few strands of hair behind his shoulders. “I figured you wouldn’t want me laying naked under the tree with a bow on my head so I picked something else.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I know I'm still behind by a day! I'm going to try to catch up but there's a chance that I'll just post the last chapter on the 26th instead of the 25th. Turns out all this writing has given me a pretty sore wrist so I'm gonna try to dial it back and take it easy over the next few chapters because I literally have to. So I might just be a day behind from here on out. 
> 
> This takes place immediately after last night's chapter of Curve so the reference to it is there. I just want to remind everyone that this is a side fic and not required reading by any means so no plot points will be resolved in it. I want curve to be able to be read as a standalone without reading this fic too so this is just holiday fluff and a lot of pining from now until the end. So please don't expect anything to be resolved in this!
> 
> Thank you SO MUCH for the love, I am truly overwhelmed! I promise to catch up on comments as soon as I can!!

Crowley tries not to drag his feet as they make it back into the flat. He’s hot now, the collar of his shirt and the knot of his tie feeling suffocating against his throat. He can still feel the warmth of Aziraphale’s body pressed against his as they danced slowly, can still feel the way their fingers had Reiner together. 

His heart feels a little frozen in his chest, the beginning layer of frost starting to seep deeper. They hadn’t talked about it since Crowley had made his promise— the one he  _ wanted  _ to keep. 

“Can’t believe we still have to write an article after that.” Crowley grumbles because at some point someone is going to have to break the silence. Might as well be him. 

“It’s not like we didn’t know that was coming.” Aziraphale comments mildly, already working on his bow tie. 

Crowley watches for a moment, memories of just an hour prior filling his mind. He knew what that skin tasted like, knew where along the column of his throat Aziraphale liked to be kissed. It was intimate knowledge that Crowley was lucky to have and he knew that— god to the very core of his bones he could feel how blessed he had been to get to unravel Aziraphale like that, to be able to hear his name on Aziraphale’s lips as a breathless moan.

Crowley tears his eyes away and halts his train of thought. Now is not the time for that. Now is the time for sucking it up, for swallowing down any words he wants to say, no matter how bitter they are. Now is the time to hold firm in the face of a storm, to refuse to be blown away as he waits to see where everything settles. Now is not the time to unwrap Aziraphale  _ again _ .

(It sounds appealing though).

“Doesn’t mean I have to hate it any less.” Crowley makes quick work of his own tie and drops it on a table just inside the door. He unbuttons his jacket and slides it off, tossing it on the back of a nearby chair. “You have to admit that this assignment is sort of turning Christmas into a chore.”

“I have to do no such thing.” Aziraphale sends him a withering look and Crowley can see a small spot of red blooming just by Aziraphale’s collarbone. His stomach clenches. “I’m having a rather lovely time sharing this assignment with you.”

“That’s because you’re not the one doing the writing.” Crowley teases, his voice thin and raw. Aziraphale looks at him and clearly understands what he’s going for. “ S’easier for you.”

Blessedly, Aziraphale meets him halfway. “Oh, please. You call editing  _ your _ writing easy? Do you even know what a comma is?”

“Sure do.” Crowley retorts and he feels the knot in his chest loosening a bit. “It’s that little swooshy thing.”

“That little swooshy thing.” Aziraphale echoes, the ghost of a smile curling around the edges of his lips. “Articulate.”

“It’s okay to be impressed.”

“Mmm. I’ll keep that in mind in case you ever impress me.” Aziraphale retorts and it gets a solid laugh out of Crowley.

Crowley takes in a breath and blows it out slowly, his shoulders shaking. “You’re a bastard.”

Aziraphale grins and gives a little wiggle where he’s standing and Crowley feels the last of the tension dissipate from his shoulders. He can do this, whatever  _ this _ is. Because right now, this moment, this is normal. This is the life he’s built with Aziraphale. This is what he’s used to, what he looks forward to, what he finds comfort in.

If Aziraphale is going to end it, well, Crowley is going to make  _ him _ do that, And until then, he’s going to hold on tight and take whatever is offered to him.

The same train of thought seems to be dragging through Aziraphale’s mind because he looks up at Crowley, blue eyes bright but weighed down with the same anchoring feeling that Crowley has in his gut.

“Everything until after the holidays” Aziraphale murmurs, reaching out to smooth a hand down Crowley’s chest, where his tie had previously been laying. “Right?”

“Right.” Crowley agrees, swallowing thickly and placing his hand over Aziraphale’s where it rests above on his chest, just above the rapid beating of his heart.

* * *

They manage to change back into casual clothes with minimal fuss and melt back into the usual comfort that they have around each other. Crowley has switched into a pair of joggers and a tshirt, choosing to wrap himself up in a blanket instead of putting on an extra layer. Aziraphale has swapped his tartan pajama shirt for a casual cream jumper but still has his tartan pajama pants on because he might actually combust if he isn’t wearing  _ something _ tartan, Crowley is starting to realize.

They have a whole series of rolls of wrapping paper spread out before them with a single roll of tape between them. Aziraphale is wielding a pair of scissors while Crowley stacks a series of boxes at his side. 

“When did you go shopping?” Aziraphale asks, dubiously eyeing Crowley’s pile of presents. “You haven’t left the flat this week.”

“It’s called the internet, angel.” Crowley smirks, just a little. “Heard of it?”

“Oh, you are such a nasty man.” Aziraphale admonishes, reaching across Crowley to grab a particular roll of paper. “I should have known you’d be too lazy to do your shopping in person.”

“You call it lazy.” Crowley shrugs, selecting which box he wants to start with. “I call it working efficiently.”

“Of course you do.”

Crowley had gotten all of his Christmas shopping done in one fell swoop online, ordering what he wanted for everyone in his life. There weren’t many people he cared about getting gifts for— Anathema, Newt and Aziraphale, obviously— so it wasn’t like it had been a particularly big chore.

But he had spent a lot of time trying to figure out what to get Aziraphale. Anathema had been easy— she’d been looking for some new kitchen utensil for the cafe— and Newt just wanted some new piece of technology that he could break. But Aziraphale— Aziraphale hadn’t asked for anything. They hadn’t even  _ talked _ about whether they were going to exchange gifts or not. It was perfectly reasonable to think that they wouldn’t— they were only bound together by a lie, after all. Crowley wasn’t particularly in the habit of giving gifts to the people he lied to.

And yet, even though there was every reason for him to not get Aziraphale a gift, it was inconceivable to Crowley. 

So, he’d spent a lot of time looking at different options on the internet, wracking his brain for any hint Aziraphale may have dropped without realizing it. It had taken him a long time and many,  _ many _ pages of google search results before he’d finally come up with something, It wasn’t anything big or flashy, but it was perfect. Crowley had been nearly chomping at the bit in anticipation of it arriving.

When it  _ had _ arrived, he’d had to bring it in and hide it somewhere swiftly, waiting for a moment alone to inspect it and see if it was everything he wanted it to be. And then Aziraphale had gone out shopping on his own for his Christmas gifts and Crowley had been given the opportunity he needed. Aziraphale had barely been out the door before Crowley was tearing it open and inspecting it, making sure it met all of his expectations.

And it did— more than that, it  _ exceeded _ them.

So he’d packaged it back up and hid it away until he got a chance to wrap it.

Crowley stares at all of the wrapping paper in front of him, trying to decide which one he wants to wrap Aziraphale’s gift with. Anathema will be easy, she’ll get the cartoon Santa paper. And Newt will probably get the red and green plaid. But Aziraphale deserves more than just cartoony wrapping paper, he deserves something beautiful and elegant, just like he is.

Crowley picks up the red and glitter gold.

“Do you even know how to wrap gifts?” Aziraphale asks and it’s a small amount accusatory but mostly just an honest question.

“I can wrap boxes.” Crowley says with a shrug. “Nothing more complicated than that.”

Aziraphale watches for a moment as Crowley measures out the wrapping paper, dutifully handing the scissors over when Crowley extends a hand into the space between them. The scissors glide through the wrapping paper surprisingly well and in no time he’s taping the last corner down.

“See? I have a few skills, angel. Give me some credit.”

“Who is it for?” Aziraphale asks and Crowley feels his heart stutter in his chest.

“Er, well, it’s for you, actually.” He stumbles over the words, unsure of how Aziraphale is going to react to the admission.

“Me?”

“Yeah.” Crowley scrubs a hand along the back of his neck, brushing a few strands of hair behind his shoulders. “I figured you wouldn’t want me laying naked under the tree with a bow on my head so I picked something else.”

Aziraphale’s cheeks are dusted pink as he clearly tries to suppress a smile, determined not to give Crowley the satisfaction of finding amusement in what he’d said. “Well that does sound lovely, darling. But I do like unwrapping things so at least consider covering yourself in some wrapping paper before you lay under the tree.”

“Well if that’s the case, angel.” Crowley replies evenly, trying his hardest to maintain Aziraphale’s carefully crafted disinterest. He’s failing about as miserable as Aziraphale is, both of them not meeting the other’s eyes or they’d see the humor there. “You’re about to have two spectacular gifts on Christmas morning.”

Aziraphale hums in consideration. “I suppose I’ll have to find a way to repay you then, won’t I?”

“Nah,” Crowley waves a hand as he gently sets Aziraphale’s gift underneath the tree and sets in on Anathema’s. “Season of giving and all that, you know? Just being selfless.”

That finally cracks Aziraphale who laughs openly, shaking his head as he snags the scissors back from Crowley. He mumbles something under his breath about Crowley being ridiculous and Crowley allows himself to sink into it, to let it wrap around him, to block his view of the future. 

They work quietly for a while, Christmas music playing in the background. They only squabble over the tape once and Crowley goes out of his way to dramatically tape nearly every inch of Newt’s gift just to hold onto the tape for as long as possible, relishing in the disapproving looks Aziraphale was shooting him with every ‘ _ wait, just one more piece…’ _

Soon enough, underneath their tree is filled with different gifts, their respective handwriting covering the labels on each to help differentiate. Crowley can’t deny that it adds an additional layer of festivity to the house, that it feels more seasonal than it had before. He stands back and stares at the gifts, impressed at the way his flat continues to fill with the kind of spirit he’d never know. He doesn’t want to admit that he likes it, but he does.

“Still feel like Crhistmas is a chore?” Aziraphale asks, his voice quiet as he’s directly at Crowley’s side, close enough that their shoulders brush.

“Did you see how much effort I put into wrapping?” Crowley answers, “Course I do.”

Aziraphale hums and turns to face Crowley, a mischievous glint in his blue eyes. “That’s a shame, because I was hoping you’d be in good enough spirits for me to convince you to let me open a gift early.”

“That’s hardly the spirit of the season there, angel.” Crowley laughs, his stomach tightening as he looks back at Aziraphale. “Plus you only have one gift under there. Don’t want to ruin Christmas itself, do you?”

“I believe you said I had  _ two _ gifts?” There’s a feigned level of innocence in Aziraphale’s voice that has Crowley’s heart flip flopping in his chest.

“I was—”

Before he can finish that sentence, Aziraphale is reaching out to place a bow delicately on top of his head. It’s not sticking and will likely fall off if Crowley moves even the tiniest bit, but the point comes across loud and clear.

“So, what do you say to an early Christmas gift?” Aziraphale asks again, already leaning in.

“You know what angel?” Crowley feels the anticipation sizzle across his skin, nestle underneath it and make him feel alive. “You’ve been good this year. I’m sure Santa would be fine with one early gift.”

Aziraphale kisses him and the moment their lips touch, the bow falls off of Crowley’s head and he feels properly unwrapped.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Yeah, well,” Crowley grouches, sinking lower into his seat and drawing his mug of coffee closer. “It’s going to take some serious magic to get me out on ice skates.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First and foremost, I want to thank you guys for being patient with me and for caring so much about my wellbeing! My wrist is still bothering me if I type for too long but I would like everyone to rest assured! I am actually a physical therapist irl so I promise I know how to take care of myself. I might just continue to be slow to update as I can't write much without it hurting. And if you aren't assured, know that I have the best friends who take very diligent and thorough care of me and who have been there the last week while I've been taking my break. If you don't trust me to take care of myself, trust that they're doing absolutely everything they can to take care of me. I will be fine, I promise. But I do appreciate all the concern and the love so very much!
> 
> Secondly, if you read both this and curve, it's now a little staggered because I took that week off and I apologize for that. All of these chapters happen in the timeline before the next chapter of curve. I'm not intending to delay the update to curve so just know as you're reading these and this week's chapter that the timeline is now a little weird because of me. I'm sorry for that!
> 
> This chapter just made me laugh so I hope you guys enjoy it like I did! Thank you SO MUCH for all the love and support! I promise and SWEAR to catch up on comments someday!

If there’s one simple fact that can be said about a certain Anthony J. Crowley, it’s that he’s a cold-blooded creature and does not, under any circumstance, do well in the snow. He had already put up with it once for Aziraphale and had damn near lost his fingers  _ and _ his toes in the process, he wasn’t keen on doing it again.

“It’s on the list, Crowley.” Aziraphale pleads, thrusting the list in Crowley’s general direction as if that would somehow help the situation.

“We don’t have to do  _ everything _ on the bloody list!” Crowley replies even though he knows it’s factually untrue. There were only twelve things on the list as it was, they didn’t get to skip any. The most they got to do was decide the order in which they wanted to do each thing. “Make our own entry or whatever.”

“Or whatever.” Aziraphale echoes with a particularly stubborn downturn of his lips. “Because you have enough Christmas spirit to come up with something festive for us to do, do you?”

“I have enough  _ brains _ .” Crowley retorts and he winces at how petulant it sounds.

Aziraphale huffs and sets the list down on the kitchen counter in front of Crowley’s cup of coffee. “It’s not about  _ brains _ , dear. It’s about the  _ feeling _ of it, the Christmas magic!”

“Magic’s not real.” There’s a brief moment where Aziraphale’s eyes darken and then Crowley sees the hint of a smile at the corner of his lips as Aziraphale rummages in his pocket for a moment before reaching out towards Crowley’s ear. “No, no! I take it back! I take it back! Don’t you  _ dare— “ _

Aziraphale withdraws his hand and the glint of the coin pinched between two of his fingers doesn’t escape Crowley’s notice.

The first time Aziraphale had shown Crowley his “magic” act was some number of years ago when they were both far too drunk at a bar after one of the conferences, three topics to the left of where they had started. Aziraphale had been  _ awful _ at it but at the time, Crowley had chalked it up to their sheer level of drunkenness. Surely, when sober, Aziraphale couldn’t actually be  _ that _ bad…

Crowley had been very, very wrong.

The drunkenness had, in fact, been impairing Crowley’s ability to tell just  _ how _ bad Aziraphale was. In the light of the day the next morning, Crowley hung over and barely munching on a piece of toast, Aziraphale had decided to perform an encore. He’d dropped the coin no less than three times from his trembling fingers and one of the times it had even fallen into Crowley’s jacket and it had taken them far too long to find it again.

“Magic.” Aziraphale repeats wistfully and he looks distinctly smug.

“Yeah, well,” Crowley grouches, sinking lower into his seat and drawing his mug of coffee closer. “It’s going to take some serious magic to get me out on ice skates.”

* * *

Aziraphale grips the side of the rink with both hands, his knuckles turning as white as the ice as his ankles wobble underneath him. Perhaps he should have listened to Crowley and crossed this one off of the list. Only Beelzebub would have known that they’d taken some liberty and changed one of the topics. And honestly, the wrath of Beelzebub was likely less terrifying than the prospect of whatever torture was about to happen here. 

“Perhaps I should have listened to you.” Aziraphale murmurs. 

“Oh, figured that out, did you?” Crowley is practically wrapped around one of the poles that is supporting the perimeter of the rink. “What gave it away?”

Aziraphale turns to look at Crowley and shifts a little, feeling the way his feet try to slide out from underneath him. He scrambles, taking a few baby steps forward and nearly pitches onto his arse as the blades beneath him prove to be both very hard to control and very unforgiving. 

“We just—“ Aziraphale catches himself on the banister and hauls himself so he’s leaning half of his body over it. “We just need to get our footing. From there it should be—“ 

He doesn’t finish the statement. 

Next to him there’s a loud clatter and then a groan as Crowley lands flat on his arse, sunglasses askew and hair fanning out around him on the ice. 

Aziraphale tries not to laugh, he really does. Crowley could be hurt and that would not be humorous in the least. But watching Crowley prop himself up on an elbow, the other hand moving to rub circles into his sore hip as bits of ice cling to the longer strands of his hair proves too much for Aziraphale who can’t stop his shoulders from shaking as Crowley glares absolute daggers at the ice below him. 

“I’m sorry, darling. I don’t mean to laugh at you.” He gasps between fits of giggles as Crowley turns his glaring to Aziraphale instead of the offending ice. 

“Piss off.” Crowley grumbled and, though his ego has most certainly been wounded, there’s no bite to his words. “I probably have a concussion.”

That sobers Aziraphale up quickly and suddenly he’s completely forgetting about the unsteady legs beneath him and reaching for Crowley instead, intending to haul him to his feet for proper inspection. 

“Did you hit your head?”

He’s reaching for Crowley’s hand— reaching and  _ leaning _ — 

And then he’s falling. Perhaps even less gracefully than Crowley had fallen. 

It happens all at once, really. Aziraphale barely even registers that he’s moving at all and suddenly he’s a pile of limbs on the ground, his round edges wrapped around Crowley’s hard angles, their bodies mingling together in a way that might almost be scandalous if it wasn’t so unbearably  _ painful _ . 

All those movies that show someone falling on top of their love interest are a  _ lie,  _ Aziraphale thinks pointedly as he tries to find purchase on something to stabilize himself. There’s not a single romantic thing about this, honestly. In fact there are many things about it that are quite the opposite of romantic. 

For example, Aziraphale can feel bony ribs beneath his elbow and the uneven way Crowley’s chest is rising and falling beneath his as he gasps for some sort of breath. Aziraphale is fairly certain it’s a knee he feels wedged just inside of one of his hips and their arms are some weird jumble where Aziraphale can’t actually tell which one belongs to him and which belongs to Crowley. He’s not sure either of them would be in control of their respective arms right now, even if he knew, so it really doesn’t matter. 

“For fuck’s sake.” Crowley groans around a cough. “I know I’m supposed to catch you when you fall, angel, but I gotta be honest here. That phrase is supposed to be figurative.” 

“Oh, darling, are you alright?” Aziraphale tries desperately to find purchase for the one arm he does still have control over but the ice is slippery and Crowley is continuing to defy laws of physics by seeming to be  _ everywhere.  _ Aziraphale can’t find anywhere to place his hand that isn’t some strange angle of Crowley or a soaking wet patch of ice. “I’m terribly sorry! I’m trying— I can’t seem to find— I just want to  _ get up _ .”

“Angel.” Crowley’s voice stills Aziraphale and he glances down to finally meet Crowley’s eyes— to see the gorgeous flush to his cheeks that makes Aziraphale want to kiss him right here and now. “Just take a second.”

“But you’re—“

“Not dead.” Crowley interrupts. “And I’m already battered and bruised so what will a few more seconds harm?”

“Oh—“ Aziraphale can’t stop himself from leaning down to plant a gentle kiss on Crowley’s lips. Crowley kisses back for a moment before wincing and pulling back enough. 

“Ngk, sorry, angel. I just—“ 

“No, no, of course!” Aziraphale takes stock of their situation. “If you could just—“ he gestures sort of vaguely with one hand “gather your limbs.”

Crowley huffs out a laugh and starts to pull himself together and suddenly Aziraphale can finally tell which body parts belong to each of them. He finds clear purchase on the ice and is able to hoist himself up and off to the side, settling next to Crowley on his own patch of ice. Crowley takes his time sitting up, taking stock of his body and moving things as though he wants to make sure they still work. Aziraphale watches closely, acutely aware of all the people skating on around them. 

After a few moments, Crowley seems satisfied that all of him still exists to some extent and glances over at Aziraphale, as if checking him for injuries. Aziraphale waves him off quickly, showing him swiftly that his fingers do still bend and he can move his feet. It seems enough to satisfy Crowley who immediately starts unlacing his skates with a sort of viciousness Aziraphale has never seen him exhibit before. 

“Well.” Crowley says as he all but yanks the first boot off of his foot. “Fuck that.”

“Yes, I rather agree.” Aziraphale begins to scoot towards the exit that will lead back to the solid ground which is, embarrassingly, only a few feet away. “Can’t say I’m keen on trying this again.” 

It only takes a moment for Aziraphale to be setting himself on solid ground and moving just to the side so that people can still get on and off the ice around him. Crowley is in the middle of ripping his other boot off of his foot and tossing it in the general direction of the exit. It clatters next to Aziraphale and skids past him, coming to a stop just a mere second before the second one comes crashing in next to it.

“I’m writing a terrible review.” Crowley grumbles as he crawls towards Aziraphale and back onto solid ground. “And I’m including pictures of all my bruises.”

“We aren’t writing  _ reviews _ , darling. That’s not what the column is about.” Aziraphale is steadily unlacing his own skates and taking them off with far less irritation than Crowley, even though his elbows and knees feel distinctly bruised, too.

“Beelzebub told us to write about these experiences.” Crowley points out as he settles next to Aziraphale and out of the way of the throng of people. “That’s basically a review. And I would give this experience negative stars if I could.”

Aziraphale chuckles as he sets his second skate gently on the ground next to him. “Perhaps I should write today’s article.”

“Absolutely not.” Crowley remarks but he collapses into Aziraphale’s side, his head nesting into the crook of Aziraphale’s neck. “I won’t let you censor me.”

That gets a fond huff out of Aziraphale as he wraps an arm around Crowley’s shoulders and tugs him the tiniest bit closer. “I’d never dream of it, darling. I certainly know I couldn’t manage it if I tried.”

Crowley hums some sort of sound that’s probably meant to be a response but it’s not actually a word, not really even a syllable, so Aziraphale leaves it alone and strokes a hand gently down Crowley’s back and across his shoulders. He knows they need to get home soon so that he can actually check on Crowley’s injuries, so that he can tend properly to them. He’s certain that Crowley isn’t going to make it easy, either. But for the moment, just holding Crowley close as people demonstrate far superior athletic abilities in front of them is enough.

For just a moment, Aziraphale will allow himself to have this. He drops a kiss to the top of Crowley’s head and tightens his grip around Crowley’s shoulders.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of my love to [hanap](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanap/pseuds/hanap) and [NaroMoreau](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NaroMoreau/pseuds/NaroMoreau) who are the friends who have been taking care of me and who are also incredibly talented writers. If you haven't read anything by them, I HIGHLY suggest that you check them out because they have so many wonderful stories that I KNOW you will love!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’d rather do that _never_.” Crowley’s vehement now, placing his fork on the counter and turning to look at Aziraphale. “I will not carol. I don’t give a fuck how upset it makes Beelzebub, I won’t do something so demeaning.”
> 
> “It’s not demeaning to have holiday spirit, Crowley.”
> 
> “It’s demeaning to sing for random strangers!”
> 
> “Is that your way of saying you have a terrible singing voice?” Aziraphale teases around a bite of his food.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Remember me?? hahah!
> 
> First and foremost, thank you guys for being so patient with me! I know I've been gone awhile. First my wrist started to act up again, then I was sick for a while, and then I got better and then I got sick _again_. Add that with the holidays and the fact that I work in healthcare so I've been working every day and I was just not feeling well and burnt out and overwhelmed in general. The good news is that I'm not sick anymore! And that I have slept A LOT in the last two weeks so I'm feeling human again!
> 
> In an attempt to stop being terribly overwhelmed though, I've got a few things happening, The first is that I FINALLY caught up on all comments!! So I'm sorry if you saw me pop in your email like a month and a half later, I was VERY behind! But not anymore! So that goes a long way to making me feel. better! The other thing is that I'm working on cleaning up my account and finishing some things up so I don't have a million things ongoing at once! Which means that I want to crank the rest of these chapters out in the next week or so before I update Curve again because I just need this finished. So if it get s bit out of order like that, it's just me trying to tie up some loose ends so I can stop feeling like I have too much happening!
> 
> Again, thank you guys for being so patient with me, I am eternally grateful <3 I hope you enjoy seeing our idiots back together again!!! This is very much not proofread as I just finished writing it and am now throwing it out into the world so I'm sorry if it's a horrible mess! There is also a mild spice at the end and I've marked it as usual so keep an eye out for that!!

It takes a lot of convincing and a call to the doctors office for Aziraphale to believe that Crowley doesn’t actually have a concussion after this mishap with the ice skating.

He _does_ come out of it with a pretty nasty bump on his head and a few bruises, though. The doctor gives Aziraphale strict orders on how to monitor Crowley and what signs to look for and advises him to wake Crowley every few hours during the night to make sure he’s fine. He is, as evidenced by his increasingly irritable attitude every time Aziraphale wakes him up. He’s not nasty— he’d never be nasty to Aziraphale— but he is grumpy and sleep deprived and after the third time, Crowley drags himself across the bed and pillows his head on Aziraphale’s chest, muttering about how Aziraphale can watch his breathing form here and dear _someone_ , he is not to be woken again.

Eventually Aziraphale had fallen asleep, too and even though he had know that Crowley was ultimately fine, he had been immensely relieved to wake up the next day to find Crowley still sleeping soundly on him, his chest rising and falling with deep, even breaths.

For a brief moment, he considers waking Crowley to start the day but then decides that he had disrupted his sleep enough as it was. He’s comfortable enough and surprisingly not unbearably hot, despite the covers and the body that are laid out across him. So Aziraphale reaches carefully over Crowley to snag the book he keeps on the night stand, moving as little as possible as he rearranges his pillows to get into a better reading position. Crowley stirs once, but doesn’t wake. He just adjusts himself, pulling himself higher up so his head is buried under Aziraphale’s chin. He lets out a hum of contentment and immediately drops back into stillness, save for his steady breathing.

Aziraphale threads one hand into Crowley’s hair, the other propping the book open between his fingers, It’s hard to manage and he has to free his first hand from time to time to flip a page but he wouldn’t change anything about it. The longer he lays in this position, though, the more he starts to feel the stiff aches from his time on the ice yesterday. He can only imagine how Crowley is going to feel when he wakes up. He had certainly taken the brunt of the injuries and before bed last night there had already been some bruises starting to form. He wasn’t honestly sure how fast bruises formed, but they were a pretty angry purple on Crowley’s elbows and his ribs before bed and he assumed that normal bruises didn’t get _that_ dark in such a short period of time.

Somewhere admit his thinking, Aziraphale neglects his book and it slips from his fingers, dropping onto his chest with a gentle sound. He doesn’t think much of it until Crowley stirs again, pulling away and blinking up at Aziraphale sleepily.

“Would you look at that,” He says, his voice thick with sleep but not enough that it manages to hide the sarcastic edge. “I didn’t die while I slept. Incredible.”

“Oh hush,” Aziraphale replies, lifting the book off of his chest and using it to whack Crowley on the shoulder. “I’ll hear none of that today.”

“Don’t think you have a choice, angel.” Crowley pulls away to his side of the bed, laying flat on his back and letting out a groan as he stretches his arms overhead, twisting slightly in what looks like pain in his side. “Unless you’ve found some way to turn your ears off. Which, actually, would be a bit of a scientific miracle—“

Aziraphale’s next attack comes with a pillow instead of a book, smacking Crowley right in the face in the middle of his sentence. Crowley is somewhere between absolutely shocked and completely bemused as he rips the pillow out of Aziraphale’s clutches and holds it against his chest instead.

“I said—“

“I know what you _said_.” Crowley’s smile is downright delighted as he looks at Aziraphale over the edge of the pillow, his eyes bright and wide awake suddenly. “I just can’t believe you’d whack someone who is already injured!”

Aziraphale knows that a pillow absolutely does not hurt. Plus, it’s not like Crowley is bruised on his face anyways, but he feels guilty all the same. He huffs, and flips onto his side so he can look at Crowley better, bringing an arm up to cradle his head since he no longer has a pillow. “How are you feeling?”

“Like shit,” Crowley replies immediately, but he doesn’t seem put out by it, despite the fact that Aziraphale thinks he must be telling the truth. “I’d turn to face you but I think that whole side of my torso is a giant bruise.”

“Oh, darling, is it that bad? Would you like me to get some ice for you?” Aziraphale is already pressing up onto his elbow to head to the kitchen but Crowley’s hand flies out and catches him before he can go anywhere.

“Just lay with me for a bit, angel,” He says quietly and Aziraphale is helpless but to oblige him, already sinking back into the bed. “I just way to stay in bed today. Can we do that?”

“We can do whatever you’d like, darling,”

* * *

And so they do stay in bed well into the afternoon, finding some configuration where Aziraphale can watch a movie and Crowley can lay pain free next to him, dozing in and out of sleep. Aziraphale watches him closely, telling himself it has everything to do with keeping an eye on Crowley’s breathing like the doctor had said and absolutely nothing to do with how beautiful Crowley looks in his sleepy haze, hair fanned out around him on the pillow.

And so _what_ if his throat goes a little dry, that’s not the important part. He just hasn’t been able to drag himself out of bed for a glass of water yet today, there’s nothing more to it.

Finally, though, hunger takes over. They order food but Aziraphale still insists that they eat it in the kitchen because he will _not_ be sleeping on crumbs tonight, no matter how much Crowley tries to play the injury card. Crowley whines for a bit before relenting and dragging himself out of bed to meet Aziraphale at the kitchen counter where there’s already some pain killers and a glass of water waiting for him. Aziraphale is busy dishing up their food as Crowley takes his medicine, his hair wild and beautiful around his shoulders. He looks completely unkempt in the best possible way.

“You do know that we still have an article to write today.” Aziraphale places a plate of food down in front of Crowley.

Crowley picks up his fork but makes no attempt to actually eat any of it, instead focusing that golden gaze on Aziraphale. “And? What’s the death sentence today?”

“It’s not a _death_ _sentence_. _”_

_“_ I’m sure you would’ve said that yesterday, too, and look at where that got us!”

“Neither of us are dead!”

“We’re much closer than we thought we’d be!”

“If your idea of _much closer to death_ is a few bruises, you really must have a slim grasp on reality.”

“First you hurt my body,” Crowley snipes, but he’s smiling, He’s always smiling when Aziraphale says something snarky to him, like he can’t possibly get enough delight in those moments. Aziraphale can’t help the way it makes his stomach flip. “And now you hurt my feelings? Honestly, I’m going to have to think of a new nickname for you because that’s hardly angelic of you.”

“If you remember,” Aziraphale emphasizes as he takes a seat next to Crowley with his own plate of food, “I never wanted a nickname to begin with, so you’re more than welcome to get rid of it.”

“You love angel.” Crowley waves his fork like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, like he’s completely and utterly secure in this fact.

And the truth was that he _should_ be. Aziraphale did love the nickname angel now, and he didn’t want Crowley to ever stop calling him that. He didn’t want to be anyone else’s angel and he certainly didn’t want to be anything else to Crowley besides his angel.

He can’t very well say that, though, so he instead he huffs and takes a pointed bite of food to end the side conversation before redirecting them to what they’re meant to be talking about. “I was thinking that perhaps today we could go caroling?”

“Absolutely not.” Crowley says immediately. “Hell no.”

“Would you rather do that later this week?”

“I’d rather do that _never_.” Crowley’s vehement now, placing his fork on the counter and turning to look at Aziraphale. “I will _not_ carol. I don’t give a fuck how upset it makes Beelzebub, I won’t do something so _demeaning_.”

“It’s not demeaning to have holiday spirit, Crowley.”

“It’s demeaning to sing for random strangers!”

“Is that your way of saying you have a terrible singing voice?” Aziraphale teases around a bite of his food.

“Betrayed,” Crowley points his fork accusingly at Aziraphale, tucking a stray piece hair behind his ear. “By my own husband of all people. Honestly, are there no good people left in this world?”

“There certainly seem to be _dramatic_ people left in this world.” Aziraphale points out with a smile and a roll of his eyes.

Crowley sneers and finally takes a bite of his own food. “You can’t change my mind. I don’t _sing_.”

* * *

Apparently Crowley _does_ sing, he just doesn’t do it for strangers. He also doesn’t do it sober.

But he’s currently not sober, if the half empty bottle of wine on the counter is any indication. He’s not too far gone, but he’s had just enough to take the edge off and to make him feel loose as he leans over the kitchen counter and sings Christmas Carols very off tune and out of tempo.

The only saving grace is the fact that Aziraphale, also tipsy, is equally off tune and out of tempo. And somehow it works impeccably well together, even though it absolutely should not. Truly, the more they sing, slinging their arms around each other and stumbling about the kitchen in some haphazard pattern that was supposed to mimic a dance but didn’t, the more Crowley thought that the strangers whose houses they would’ve caroled at should be thankful. It wouldn’t be some fun holiday memory, it would be an assault on their eardrums if they had been forced to listen to this mess. Honestly, Crowley refusing to go out and carol properly was a _favor_ to their neighbors.

Plus, there’s also the small fact that he likes keeping Aziraphale to himself.

When another song comes to an end, Crowley finally takes a seat back at the barstool he had abandoned some number of songs ago. His side is throbbing from his bruise and his head is pounding with a combination of the almost concussion, one of his usual headaches and the alcohol but he doesn’t care. He’s having a good time despite the fact that he’s really not doing anything other than making an absolute fool of himself.

He takes a sip from his wine, the flavor dulling as he gets more of a buzz, and then says something that he hadn’t meant to say aloud at all. Something he’d only intended to think. “Y’know, this isn’t how I expected us to celebrate.”

“Celebrate?” Aziraphale echoes, propping his elbows on the counter and leaning into them. It’s one of the rare moments where he abandons his perfect posture, his perfectly crafted exterior, and allows himself to just exist for a second, completely unconcerned with what Crowley might think of him because he likely knows by now that Crowley couldn’t think a bad thing about him ever, under any circumstance. “Are you back on the idea that you almost died yesterday? I’m telling you, it wasn’t _that_ serious.”

“I’m not talking about my terrible, nearly fatal wounds that you seem determined to downplay.” Crowley replies around a long sip of his wine. “I’m talking about our anniversary.”

“Our—“ He sees the moment it clicks in Aziraphale’s mind, the exact moment today’s date registers. December 20th. That’s the date Aziraphale had picked out for their fake wedding anniversary. Crowley had never asked why and he wasn’t about to. If there was any reasoning behind it, he didn’t want to know because he didn’t think his heart would be able to handle it. It was already hanging on by a thin thread as it was. “Oh, that is today, isn’t it?”

Crowley thinks that he should probably roll his eyes and make some joke about how Aziraphale forgot, lightening the mood and breezing past the subject but he finds that he can’t. “Yeah, it is. And we’re spending it drunk on wine and singing Christmas carols terribly.”

“And how would you have preferred to spend it?” Aziraphale’s voice is a hoarse whisper suddenly, as if he feels the raw weight of Crowley’s thoughts, the yearning of his heart as it strains inside of his chest to get to Aziraphale. His voice is soft and gentle and full of so much unidentified emotion that it makes Crowley feel like he’s being split in half all over again.

“Well,” Crowley begins and he’d like to say that it’s the alcohol talking but he knows that it isn’t. It’s just his heart using the alcohol has an excuse to betray him. “We could have at least gone out to dinner. And then after dinner we’d come home for some—“ he’s staring very strongly at the stem of his wine glass now, noting the way it twirls between his fingertips with so much interest that he hopes it might distract Aziraphale. It doesn’t, which becomes clear in the way that Aziraphale doesn’t respond, clearly waiting for the end of that sentence. “Dessert.”

“And this dessert—“

Oh, Aziraphale knows what he’s doing, the bastard. He knows what he’s making Crowley say. It’s clear in the way he licks his lips, eyes trained on Crowley as he waits to hear what comes next. He knows what he’s doing and Crowley knows it too and yet he can’t find it in himself to stop, to prevent himself from his next actions.

“This dessert—“ He swallows, places his palms flat against the counter, tries to relax his shoulders away from his ears.

And then, to his surprise and his absolute mercy, Aziraphale comes around the counter to stand next to him, taking one of Crowley’s hands in his own. “Why don’t you show me?”

And that is something Crowley is all too happy to oblige in.

**[skip]**

It’s messy and scattered as they stagger out of the kitchen, the buzz of the alcohol being chased off by the intoxicating feeling of being this close to each other. They press searing kisses to each other’s lips, jaws, necks, fingers gripping, holding, pulling. It doesn’t have the same urgency that it’s had before, but is instead filled with a languorous passion that devours them both whole in flames.

They make it to the family room and Crowley lays Aziraphale down on the couch, falling into him the way he has longed to for so many months now. He falls into Aziraphale, lets Aziraphale catch him, feels the weight of him there, solid and unyielding, waiting to catch Crowley, to hold him, to pull him closer. And then he gets to do the one thing he’s wanted to do from almost the very beginning— he gets to take his time.

There’s no rush as he unbuttons Aziraphale’s shirt, no rush as he lavishes attention on the newly exposed skin there. There’s not the threat of people finding them, no deadline to rush them out the door. It’s just the two of them, alone, in this place that they’ve made a home. It’s just the two of them under the warm glow of the Christmas tree, unwrapping each other.

The sounds Aziraphale makes are even more beautiful when Crowley has time to explore them, to touch and press and kiss until he finds all the right places. And oh, he finds those places and then he nestles his whole body there, making a home and refusing to leave. He finds those places and he gives them every ounce of love that’s been threatening to spill out of his body for weeks now, pours every emotion he can’t put into words into each movement and Aziraphale responds in kind, as if he can feel the words hidden behind the kisses, as if he can feel the truth written into the trails of Crowley’s fingertips.

And he kisses Crowley back with the save fervent passion, molding their bodies together as if they could possibly fuse together into one being, as if any space between them is too much space. There’s a voice in the back of Crowley’s mind reminding him that this isn’t real, that they don’t actually have an anniversary to celebrate, but every time Azirpahale kisses him, that voice gets quieter and quieter, lost in the fire of the desire that is lighting him up.

Their clothes go and suddenly there’s nothing between them as they come together again and Crowley thinks that it’s beautiful, really. The idea that they could be just themselves, bare to the other, folding together like that’s how they’re mean tot be. He thinks it’s beautiful and heart wrenching and he holds Aziraphale closer as their bodies fall in sync the way their hearts already have, cresting at the same time.

**[end skip]**

And as they pull together in the warm afterglow, the Christmas lights twinkling behind them, Crowley feels a small part of his heart chip to know that he’s gotten this beautiful thing once and he will never get it again. Not the same way. There won’t be another anniversary, another night to hold Aziraphale in the warmth of their shared home. There won’t be a round two or three or twelve. He buries his head in Aziraphale’s chest and tries not to think about it, letting Aziraphale soothe away his worries by tracing patterns into the exposed skin fo his back. He pretends that the letters Aziraphale is drawing spell out some secret message, searing it into his skin so that he may know it, even if he can’t hear it.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Okay, here’s the deal.” Aziraphale says, matter of fact despite the gentle smile tilting up the corners of his lips. “We’re going to watch a Christmas movie. You’re not allowed to complain about it. And I’m going to write the article.”
> 
> “I can write the article, angel. Really, I’m feeling better.” Crowley tries to pull the ice pack off of his head to make a point but Aziraphale stops him, shaking his head,
> 
> “I don’t believe I left this open for discussion.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello for the second day! I am *trying* to finish this with daily updates like I planned initially to get it out of the way so we can go back to the main fic because having an ongoing Christmas fic in February is stressing me out lmao. But I do have some time consuming responsibilities this week so I won't promise anything!
> 
> Anyways, I call this chapter: I have a massive migraine and feel like a burden to those around me and so Crowley must, too. xD Poor Crowley, he doesn't deserve this.
> 
> Honestly I feel like these chapters are becoming a disaster because they cover very little of the thing they're meant to be writing the article about so I'm sorry that I've somehow ended up a little to the left like this. But this is how the chapters want to be written so who am I to fight them?

The pounding shows no signs of stopping.

Crowley stands hunched over in the bathroom, hands braced firmly against the counter, head hung between his shoulders and the world still throbs around him. His head _hurts_.

He’s no stranger to this, of course, but that doesn’t make it any easier. Normally the alcohol wouldn’t be enough to leave him feeling _this_ miserable, but mixing it with the nice knock he’d taken to the head at the ice rink left him feeling like he was three seconds away from having his skull split completely open of its own volition. He takes in a slow deep breath, trying to pull himself together before heading out to meet Aziraphale in the kitchen.

Aziraphale had gone into the university for the first part of the day— apparently Gabriel didn’t take kindly to the idea that Beelzebub had given them the week to focus on only their articles and Crowley wasn’t surprised. Gabriel didn’t seem to take kindly to any ideas that weren’t his own. Or, if he did, he would claim responsibility for the idea so that way he had a reason to care. Crowley hadn’t been thrilled to let Aziraphale go and had certainly muttered a few choice words about Gabriel under his breath, but ultimately he’d had no choice but to let Aziraphale leave. And even though he’d missed him the whole morning, it was probably good that he hadn’t been here to fret over Crowley and his pounding head.

It wasn’t hard to imagine how he would’ve been if he’d stayed home today. He likely thought he was being sneaky the last day and a half, trying to steal subtle glances at Crowley, gingerly skirting his fingers over the places where Crowley was bruised. He wasn’t nearly as sly as he thought, but Crowley knew it was coming from a place of concern and nothing more. Aziraphale was trying his best to take care of Crowley— of Crowley who was a notoriously difficult patient. He was trying to take care of Crowley, despite the fact that Crowley was a grown ass adult and could take care of a few bruises and a headache himself.

And he didn’t want to fucking admit it, but he was touched. It was hard not to be touched, honestly.

Aziraphale didn’t _have_ to be here, didn’t _have_ to care about Crowley and his wellbeing. There was nothing forcing him to treat Crowley tenderly, to read his unintentional signs and to adjust accordingly. And Crowley— he’d never experienced something like this before. Not just the concern, but the unwavering understanding. He had been trying his best to keep a straight face, to not wince when something hurt, to not give away the fact that his head felt like a bomb with a quickly burning fuse. He tried so very hard to act as if he wasn’t in any sort of pain or discomfort, but Aziraphale knew otherwise. Crowley couldn’t say what his tells were, didn’t have the slightest idea what he was doing to give it away, but he knew Azirpahale’s sharp gaze never missed a moment of it, despite his best efforts.

With one last deep breath through the nose, Crowley straighten up and turns towards the door. He’d taken as much medicine as he could possibly take for his migraine today and it didn’t seem to want to waver in the slightest. He knew that Aziraphale would pick up on it the moment their eyes met— there was no way he could keep this one hidden. The pounding in his head spiked with any sharp movement and the longer he was upright, the more severe the roaring in his ears became. He needed to lay down and he needed _ice_.

The door creaks open slowly, his hand bracing on the doorway as he slowly shuffles out into the hallway. He trails a hand along the wall as he goes, eyes half shut as he navigates his flat by muscle memory alone. Faintly in the distance he can hear Aziraphale clinking around in the kitchen— there’s the distinct sound of glasses being set on the counter and it makes Crowley smile despite himself.

For a moment, with his eyes half closed in the dim light of his hallway, he lets himself believe that this is real. He lets himself believe that they’re happily married together, that Aziraphale is bustling about the kitchen and cooking a meal for the absolute love of his life who is otherwise having a bad day. Crowley imagines that he’s humming to himself, a sort of off-key little tune under his breath that matches the bounce in his step as he putters around, dishing out different things and making something far too complicated for Crowley’s taste, but he’ll eat it and love it anyways, He imagines making it into the kitchen as being greeted by the blinding smile of his other half, Aziraphale’s eyes twinkling as he murmurs something fond, crossing the kitchen to draw Crowley in and kiss him soundly, chasing away the pain in his head.

It would be so _easy_ , he thinks bitterly as he shuffles down the hallway. So fucking _easy_ for this to be real. What he wouldn’t give to reach the end and find Aziraphale exactly as he had imagined him, to be swept away into that embrace. What he wouldn’t give to just melt against the man he loves with every fiber of his being, clinging to Aziraphale and whining about his bad day, about his head, about whatever happens to be on his mind at that time. Because he wouldn’t be a burden to Aziraphale if this was real, he would know that he had that unconditional love and support that allowed him to huff and puff about the stupidest of things with absolute security.

He reaches the kitchen after what feels like miles of walking and he finds Aziraphale there, just as he had pictured— plates out in front of him as he scoops different things onto them. But when Aziraphale looks up at him, it’s not with that blinding smile of a man totally besotted, it’s with his eyebrows knitted together in concern, the corner of his lips downturned into a frown that Crowley hates to see and hates even more to _cause_.

And it’s fine, really. It’s clear that Aziraphale’s expression is just concern as he reads all the lines of pain and discomfort in Crowley’s posture, but something about the bursting bubble of the imagine he’d had in his mind hurts anyways. It’s like the shattered pieces of that thought rain down on him, cold and sharp as they bite against his skin.

He expects Aziraphale to say something as he shuffles all the way into the kitchen finally, but Aziraphale doesn’t. Instead he just turns abruptly on his heel and heads straight for the freezer, yanking the door open and reaching in before Crowley can even utter a greeting. In what feels like the blink of an eye, Crowley suddenly finds something cold thrust into his hands and then Aziraphale is guiding him out of the kitchen and towards the family room, marching them straight past the light switch.

When Aziraphale finally does speak, it’s hushed and gentle. “Sit, darling. I’ll bring your dinner in here. Put the ice on your head and just take it easy.”

And Crowley is overwhelmed with so much emotion that his throat closes on the spot.

Because this? This is better than that fantasy he’d had coming down the hallway. This is that fantasy times a million, two million. This is that fantasy but _real_ — or as real as it can be anyways. The Aziraphale in his mind kissed him soundly and with so much emotion, but the Aziraphale in front of him kissed him gently on the temple, brushing a few pieces of hair out of his face before pressing a second kiss to his forehead, lingering for a moment.The Aziraphale in front of him, the _real_ one, was so much more genuine in his motions.

“Angel, I’m—“

“Hush,” Aziraphale whispered in that same hushed voice. It dawned on Crowley then that he was using that voice to be considerate of his splitting headache, that he was talking quietly on _purpose_ to try and help ease Crowley’s symptoms. The knot in his throat tightened. “I’ll be back in just a moment.”

And just like that, Crowley found himself reclining on the couch with an ice pack on his head while Aziraphale finished serving dinner. He bustled in and out of the room a few times, delicately setting a series of things down on the table in front of Crowley, turning off all the lights in his wake. It only takes a few minutes before Crowley is feeling the couch sink next to him, a clear indication that Aziraphale has finished whatever things he had to do.

Crowley sits up slowly, pulling the ice pack off of his head and blinks his eyes open to find the entire flat dark, save for the light of one candle on the table, flickering elegantly as it gives a warm glow to their surrounding area,

“Angel—“

“Is the light too much? We can blow it out if you need.”

“And eat in the dark?” Crowley asks incredulously.

“If that’s what you need.” Aziraphale replies simply. “It’s no problem, darling. Our tastebuds don’t need light. There’s no reason we can’t enjoy our food in the dark if it will help your head.”

He’s leaning halfway forward, hand reaching out towards the candle as if he’s preparing to pull it closer and blow it out. There’s something so casual in the gesture, as if this isn’t some terrible burden but instead the sort of thing that he would happily do for Crowley that cracks Crowley in half. Before he can stop himself, not that he was going to anyways, Crowley is catching Aziraphale’s hand before it can reach the candle and using it to draw Aziraphale closer and kiss him soundly. Aziraphale makes a warm noise in response, kissing him back tenderly as his hand squeezes Crowley’s in response.

It only lasts a moment before Aziraphale is pulling away, smiling at him with the same warmth that had been in his kiss and Crowley thinks, perhaps for the first time ever, that he’s glad that someone has seen him at his worst. Because for once, he doesn’t feel like he’s ruining everything.

* * *

In the end, dinner by candle light with whispered conversations is the most intimate thing Crowley has ever experienced and he’s just about to combust with the sheer feelings of it all when Aziraphale clears their plates and gives him a moment to breathe.

He’s just about to get it back together when Aziraphale resurfaces, a fresh ice pack in his hand. The words that Crowley want to say lodge in his throat as he takes it willingly, replacing it on top of his head and keeping his eyes trained on Aziraphale as he moves around the table to once again seat himself next to Crowley.

“Okay, here’s the deal.” Aziraphale says, matter of fact despite the gentle smile tilting up the corners of his lips. “We’re going to watch a Christmas movie. You’re not allowed to complain about it. And I’m going to write the article.”

“I can write the article, angel. Really, I’m feeling better.” Crowley tries to pull the ice pack off of his head to make a point but Aziraphale stops him, shaking his head,

“I don’t believe I left this open for discussion.”

Every fiber of who Crowley is screams at him that this is just a temporary arrangement— _just a week_ as they’d agreed. It was like method acting, he told himself. Aziraphale had agreed to play the role of a husband for the sake of their articles and that’s all he was doing. But there’s a part of him— a part that is growing larger with each passing day, with every kiss, every gentle caress— that is certain that this isn’t just some act. That they’ve actually grown something real between them, something strong and flourishing despite their ridiculous circumstances. There’s a part of him, deep in the core of his bones that just _knows_.

But that’s part of the conversation they agreed not to have for the next week, so Crowley swallows down whatever words have risen to the tip of his tongue and instead mutters a quiet, “Bossy.”

Aziraphale huffs out a quiet laugh before standing up to retrieve the remote. “Lay down, darling. I’ve already decided on the movie and everything.”

“If it’s terrible—“ Crowley starts to threaten.

“No, no.” Aziraphale stops him before he can get any further into his thought. “You’re not allowed to complain, remember?”

“Then I’m just going to sleep through it if it sucks.” Crowley grumbles, but he obliges and stretches his legs out along the length of the couch, nestling his head into a pillow and taking a moment to securely place the ice pack so that it won’t move.

Aziraphale fiddles with the TV for a moment and then uses the newly provided light to find the remote on the rug from where it had fallen last night. Crowley flinches at the bright light of the TV and turns his head into the pillow, trying to shield his eyes. He hears Aziraphale murmur an apology followed by a curse as he no doubt struggles with the apps on the smart TV. Crowley listens fondly, his lips curling up in a smile at the repeated _oh, come now, how difficult can this be?_

Finally a note of music sounds and Crowley recognizes the movie immediately. He doesn’t have to take his head out of the pillows to know what’s happening on screen and it makes his heart swell in his chest. He’d mentioned this to Aziraphale once, in passing. He’d even said it sort of sarcastically, a “this-is-the-only-christmas-movie-i’ll-ever-watch” sort of thing. He can’t fathom why Aziraphale had locked it into his memory then, but it makes him feel terribly fond as the realization sinks in.

“Who knew you actually listened to me.” Crowley remarked, finally drawing his face out of the pillows at the feeling of Aziraphale’s hand bracing against his hip.

Aziraphale is grinning down at him from much closer than Crowley had realized and his breath hitches in his throat as Aziraphale carefully tosses a leg over him, gingerly climbing over until he’s squeezed himself behind Crowley, flush against Crowley and the couch simultaneously. The breath makes no attempt to come back to Crowley as Aziraphale winds a hand around his waist and holds him steady as he get situated, somehow drawing Crowley even closer, despite the fact that they had been previously pressed together.

“Let’s see you sleep through this.” Aziraphale murmurs, his mouth right by Crowley’s ear now that he’s taken up the position of big spoon.

Crowley wheezes out something that is meant to be a response but absolutely isn’t. If it’s anything, it’s all the feelings choking him, begging to be let out. He takes in another breath that barely makes it past the lump in his throat and lets it out, melting back into Aziraphale’s touch instead.

“Very clever, angel.” He finally manages.

Aziraphale just hums in happiness, pressing a kiss to the back of Crowley’s shoulder. “Shush, darling. We have a movie to watch.”

And Crowley knows that he’s not about to watch any of the damn movie, but he doesn’t care. Suddenly the pounding in his head is just a dull background feeling, the absolutely searing feeling of Aziraphale’s body flush to his the only thing he can focus on. He’s not mad about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, I have no idea what tf I'm doing with these chapters lmao. Does this even fit the plot line at all? Nobody knows, least of all me. But here you go, you can have it anyways!
> 
> If you're wondering, the movie they're watching is The Holiday. It's one of my all time favorite movies and though I likely won't do it, I've already plotted out an entire GO AU to it. I plot out a Holiday AU for like every single fandom I'm ever in because I love it THAT much!

**Author's Note:**

> Me: these chapters will only be between 2-3k.  
> Me, posting the FIRST chapter: 4.4k  
> sigh.
> 
> See you guys tomorrow!!


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